May Monthly Market Check In ~ Where Are We Trending?
May 15, 2025
We certainly have had many experts weigh in on what they think our markets will look like in the future, and it seems most of them have been wrong. It is understood why confidence in these people have waned over the past few years, and we are one of the most skeptical people when it comes to predicting the housing market. Maybe we’ve been burned too often ourselves. What we do spend time studying are the Market Trends. Where are we currently heading? Although we are seeing an uptick in activity as we are full steam into the Spring selling season, we have witnessed prices staggering for quite some time now. Other than January of this year, the average Residential sales price in our area was as high as $504,000 last August only to see a bit of a correction over the past 8 months. With this renewed activity we are seeing prices rebound a little more, which could be a result of the Spring season. Although we are experiencing a slower Spring than the past 2 years as inventory has creeped up to over 4 months as buyers are still proceeding with caution. Our prices have been holding in resilient fashion however the last 3 months shows that we are increasing momentum in values. From February to March we saw an increase at .6% in values. From March to April we saw another .6% increase. The momentum over the past 2 months could turn out to be an appreciation increase of around 6-7% for 2025, however we believe it is too early to make that call.
What is expected of the FED? We believe this Forbes article articulates it well in what may be expected at the time of this writing. Keep in mind that the FED’s policies encourage short term borrowing. Mortgage rates seem to be more closely related to the 10 year Treasury Bond. https://www.forbes.com/sites/simonmoore/2025/05/12/the-2025-fed-meeting-calendar-and-what-markets-expect-for-interest-rates/
What is expected of the Housing Market? It is interesting to study what is going on in other parts of the country. Back in 2007 we were doing very well as we were holding steady onto jobs and home values here in Oregon. Many of the “sand states” were seeing values decline because of overspeculation. It took about a year for that collapse to infiltrate most of the other states like Oregon. Coinciding with the financial collapse of 2008 created the perfect storm. As we currently look at some of these states in the South we are noticing that their values have been decreasing over the past few months. This is the time of year when values should be encouraged to either uphold or increase. Does this tell us of a bigger story developing for our area? There are some interesting articles regarding value deterioration and their future speculation in multiple areas around the country. Again, what is trending?
https://www.resiclubanalytics.com/p/housing-market-widespread-softening-almost-every-major-market
Many buyers are hoping that a buyers market is on the cusp. Our typical average Buyer/Seller market is between 5-6 months of inventory. We are currently at 4.17 months. We’re trending in that direction…slowly.
The CPI (inflationary index) has slowed down to only 2% in April averaging 2.3% Year Over Year. This is encouraging news to see prices start to come down to the FED’s goal of an average of 2% YOY. It appears we still have a ways to go to meet their goal, however the numbers are trending to a more comfortable level.
All Real Estate is local. Here is a snapshot of our current Real Estate Market Trends…
| Current Active Listings (All Types) | 2872 | Up 10.5% from last month & up 14% from this time last year |
| Current Pending Listings | 1078 | Up 5% from last month & down 6% from this time last year |
| Sold Listings Last Month | 712 | Up 7% from last month & down 5% from this time last year |
| New Listings Last Month | 1243 | Up 14% from last month & down 3% from this time last year |
| Months of Inventory | 4.17 | Up 3% from last month & up 13% from this time last year |
| % List to Sold Ratio | 98% | Down 1% from last month & down .6% from this time last year |
| Absorption Rate *Based on current active listings vs sold listings for the past month | 25%* | Even from last month & down 16%from this time last year |
| Average Sales Price in All Categories | $461,000 | Up .4% from last month & up .2% from this time last year |
| Median Residential Sales Price Average Residential Sales Price **Based on Willamette Valley Multiple Listing Statistics | $450,000** $498,577** | Even from last month & up 1.6% from this time last year. Up .6% from last month & up 2% from this time last year |
| Average Owner Occupied Interest Rates ***Based on Freddiemac.com Statistics of 30 year fixed mortgage | 6.76%*** | Up 1.8% from last month & down 4.6% from this time last year |
| Consumer Price Index Average (CPI) **** Core items-FED’s Goal is 2% | 2.3%**** | Down 16% from last month & down 18% from this time last year |
+Some numbers are rounded
There seems to be quite a bit of conflicting information depending on who you gather your news and information from. What we have noticed in our area is that people fall into one of two categories. They are either afraid of what the future holds or they are encouraged and optimistic about what the leadership is doing on the national level. The community appears to be fairly split to us, partisan in nature we suppose. Regardless of how people feel about the market, it brings clarity when we analyze the data and focus on where we are trending.
Enjoy the rest of your Spring and we hope you welcome in Summer with exciting adventures!