(NewsNation) — Home sellers have been increasingly yanking their homes off the market instead of agreeing to lower prices as would-be buyers push back on higher home costs.
After five years of a hot housing market, demand has cooled down because buyers can’t bear higher prices amid persistent high interest rates, and they’re fed up with the asking prices.
Sellers delisting their homes
Sellers, as a result, don’t want to take these lower profits, so they are choosing to pull their houses off the market. In May, the rate of delisted homes increased by 47% nationwide compared to last year, according to Realtor.com.
The delisting surge “is partly due to the overall expansion in active inventory.”
“Many sellers, anchored by peak price expectations and upheld by strong equity positions, are deciding to step back if they don’t get their number,” said Danielle Hale, chief economist of Realtor.com.
Despite this, home inventory hit a new post-pandemic high. And sellers aren’t in as much of a rush to accept lower than their desired amount.
“Unlike past housing cycles where falling prices pressured underwater homeowners to sell, today’s homeowners benefit from record-high levels of home equity, so they have the flexibility to wait it out,” said Realtor.com senior economist Jake Krimmel. “This allows many sellers to withdraw their homes from the market if their asking price isn’t met.”
The Federal Reserve mantained a steady interest rate in July, with Fed Chair Jerome Powell saying at a press conference, “despite elevated uncertainty, the economy is in a solid position.”
Over 1 million homes for sale
Approximately 1.36 million homes were for sale in June, which was the most since November 2019, Zillow revealed in a July press release.
While sellers are removing their homes from the market, some are lowering their prices, according to Zillow.
In June, there was a record high 26.6% of sellers who lowered their homes prices, with cuts coming primarily from the Sun Belt and the Mountain West, Zillow data shows.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
