We literally have the worst homebuyer demand on record according to the NAR's pending sales index.
Time for people to wake up and realize prices are the problem.
1) Fed cut rates almost one year ago, and demand went down.
Think about that. September 2024 was the first rate cut, and the pending sales index back then was between 76-79.
Now it's 72.
Buyer demand dropped after rate cuts.
2) Not only that, though.
Since the Fed cut rates, we have 30% more inventory sitting on the market, and home values are now dropping in about half the U.S.
So rate cuts + way more inventory + prices dropping...and still no buyer demand improvement.
3) One reason for the lackluster buyer demand is the simple math behind buying and renting.
Right now, it costs around $2,800/month to buy a house with a mortgage.
Which is over $700 more per month than the cost to rent.
This math is keeping first-time homebuyers stuck on the sidelines, since it simply doesn't make financial sense to buy in terms of the monthly cost.
4) This math between buying and renting is being primarily driven by prices being too high.
Home values, adjusted for inflation, are way above their long-term 130-year average in the U.S.
We've literally never seen anything like this in terms of prices.
5) And for those who think "mortgage rates" are the problem, check this graph out.
Current Mortgage Rates are very normal in the course of U.S. History.
Current prices are not.
6) The data is so abundantly clear. Buyers are on strike because of prices.
-prices are at all-time highs
-mortgage rates are normal
-buyer demand is at all-time lows
I also polled you here on X, and 71% of you said prices were the problem.
(only 13% said mortgage rates)
7) What I am seeing in the market right now is that sellers of existing homes are holding things hostage.
They still want $600,000 for their house, when the market-clearing price is much less.
They saw their neighbor sell for $600,000 3 years ago, and just won't come off that number.
In the end, educating the existing seller population about the true state of the housing market should be the main policy focus of everyone in the housing market.
8) The worst part about it is that sellers who have this attitude are often in markets that are already declining, and will decline further into the future.
They're shooting themselves in the foot by overlisting their home, and delisting their home, with the misplaced idea that things will improve 6-12 months from now.
9) The onus is on local realtors to be the economist of choice and properly educate sellers about where the market is heading.
A more educated seller will list their home better, and attract more buyers, and create more transactions.
We at Reventure App provide a tool to help with that, with our 12-month price forecast helping ground sellers in reality.
10) We actually recently added a download market report feature that helps sellers, realtors, and buyers better assess the future direction of their local market and ZIP code.
Access the forecast and download report feature at under a premium plan. Start by typing in your ZIP.reventure.app
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Prices have dropped so much that Austin's housing market is now only 3% overvalued in early 2026.
This is how housing crashes can be a good thing. Prices are down nearly 25% from peak and wages have kept rising, and buyers in Austin now have significantly more affordability.
Reventure will be giving a "buy signal" on Austin once it crosses into undervalued territory.
That won't mean prices will immediately stop dropping.
But it will mean the worst is over.
And that buyers/investors can get in at a decent price point in a market that is still top of the table in organic demographic growth.
1) Here's the math on the graph from above:
Values in Austin are down roughly 15% from Dec 2021 to Dec 2025 (and they're down by 24% from May 2022 to today).
In the same span, incomes have risen by 17%.
That combination, combined with a rising base effect, has dropped Austin's overvaluation rate from 39% to 3% in the last four years.
2) The reason prices are dropping in Austin is due a combination of a) very high overvaluation during pandemic, b) excessive building and supply, c) a mini local economic recession, which has led to layoffs in the tech industry, and d) reduced inbound migration.
All of these factors have combined to result in aggressive price cuts (and rent cuts) across the market.
75% haircut in 3 years. And 50% over the last 10 years.
This condo building was built in the 1970s, and apparently has huge deferred maintenance and repairs. So existing condo owners / new buyers are getting stuck with the bill.
($326k special assessment on this unit, also needs renovation. So the buyer's all-in cost is probably closer to $700k).
In this ZIP code, condo values have dropped about 10% in aggregate the last 3 years. But clearly some units, in older buildings with huge assessments, are getting hit much worse than market average.
1) condos are an interesting asset class, because if you are in the wrong building, at the wrong time, the declines in value can be immense.
This condo would have likely sold for close to $900k-1 million in 2021/22.
Now its listed for $256k.
2) This is because in its building in Downtown St. Pete they found $45 million in needed repairs.
The building was built in 1975. And post-Surfside collapse, many of these older properties are being caught up on deferred repairs from the last couple of decades.
Multifamily vacancy rates are skyrocketing in Sun Belt Markets.
Apartmentlist is reporting we're now at the highest multifamily vacancy since 2017. And rent cuts are getting deep.
Austin is #1, at -21%.
Fort Myers, CoSprings, Phoenix, North Port, Raleigh, San Antonio, Atlanta, Denver, Lakeland, and Orlando are all at -10% or bigger.
Now - many of these markets had big rental rate run-ups after the pandemic, so rents can still appear expensive to some renters.
But they're officially getting more affordable, and rents will likely drop further in 2026 given the big surge in vacancies over the last couple of years.
1) A different way to view this data is by comparison today's rents to pre-pandemic.
San Francisco rents are up YoY, but basically flat from pre-pandemic, due to how much they dropped in 2020-21.
Austin rents are now also basically flat with pre-pandemic, up only 2.2%, due to how much they have dropped.
A host of other markets - San Antonio, Denver, San Jose, New Orleans, Minneapolis, CoSprings, and Houston - has rents up 10% from pre-pandemic.
2) If rent growth is only 10-15% over 6 years, that is not so good, as underlying inflation has been much higher than that.
Wages are up 25% or so in the same span.
Property taxes and insurance are up by much more.
So in many markets, rents are failing to keep up with wage growth and inflation.
Something big just happened in the U.S. Housing Market.
As of the end of 2025, there are now more 6%+ rate mortgage holders than sub-3%.
Meaning that the dreaded Mortgage Rate "Lock-In" Effect is fading.
Since more existing owners have a higher rate, that means more have a payment and rate closer to "market", which means there will be more incentive to sell - which is actually good news.
The 6%+ mortgage share is now 21.2%, the highest level since 2015, and nearly triple the pandemic low.
This is happening because even in today's depressed sales and refinance environment, each year about 5-6 million Americans take out a new mortgage, now at 6%+ rates.
Expect more upward pressure on new listings and inventory in future years as a result.
1) The one thing keeping inventory constrained, even in the midst of its rebound from the pandemic, has been sellers delisting homes.
And other sellers electing not to list, because they want to keep their low rate.
Now that this mortgage lock-in effect is gradually fading away, it will structurally unlock more supply, and should push inventory up further in 2026 and beyond.
2) Now the already good news is that inventory has grown sigificantly in the last 3 years.
We're now up to 1.1 million listings on the market, as of November 2025, according to Realtor.com, nearly back to pre-pandemic.
Much of this inventory growth is in the South, where prices are now dropping.
But could we see this inventory figure get to say 1.3 or 1.4 million next year, which would be the highest national inventory in over a decade?