Realtor.com Reports Active Inventory Up 26.5% YoY

Realtor.com has monthly and weekly data on the existing home market. Here is their weekly report: Weekly Housing Trends View—Data for Week Ending Nov. 23, 2024

• Active inventory increased, with for-sale homes 26.5% above year-ago levels

For the 55th consecutive week, the number of homes for sale has increased compared to the same time last year. The nationwide market is slowly rebounding to pre-pandemic levels of inventory. Buyers currently have far more options than they did a few years ago, but with prices and mortgage rates remaining high, not as many of them are within their budget. New listings showed a much more modest increase, so most of this inventory growth is the result of homes sitting on the market for longer.

• New listings—a measure of sellers putting homes up for sale—climbed 2.8% this week compared with one year ago

The number of newly listed homes for sale continued to grow this week, the fourth in a row with year-over-year new listing growth over 1.5%. This is an encouraging sign that even amid a high mortgage rate environment, some sellers are willing to list their homes and make a move. We’ve talked extensively about the lock-in effect, where homeowners who secured a low-rate mortgage in recent years are reluctant to move out and give that favorable financing up, and there are only two cures for this issue. The first, lower mortgage rates, doesn’t appear to be coming any time soon. The second, time, is finally starting to take effect, as the simple reality that people eventually have to move will force new homes onto the market even if their sellers don’t love the mortgage rate they’ll get on their next purchase.

Here is a graph of the year-over-year change in inventory according to realtor.com.

Inventory was up year-over-year for the 55th consecutive week.

However, inventory is still historically low.

New listings remain below typical pre-pandemic levels.