Springing into the fall housing market

Fall House Hunt

Experts say inventory has made a slight climb, but affordability remains an obstacle.

When it comes to buying or selling a home, any real estate agent will tell you to consider the two best times of year to enter the fray: spring and fall. The spring and fall markets typically see the most activity, but in 2025, things got off to a slow start.

Spring is often the peak of sale prices for any given year, said Kate Ziegler, a realtor with Arborview Realty in Jamaica Plain, though a bump in activity after Labor Day makes fall the second-best time to sell. “This year, spring was slow to start — inventory was very low … still and comparatively, supply has slowly risen over the summer in the city,” Ziegler said.

According to the Massachusetts Association of Realtors, or MAR, there were 7,352 single-family homes for sale across the state in May. In June, it increased only marginally to 7,399.

“We’re noticing more days on market. We’re noticing a closer list-to-sale price. We’re noticing price reductions across the state,” said Sarah Gustafson, president of MAR. “But at the end of the day, there’s still not enough housing for the people that need it, and that’s something to just be mindful of.”

Earlier this year, Ziegler suspected buyers and sellers were waiting for the other shoe to drop. “Headlines swirled around rates, around recession, and things were slow to start as a result,” she said. Dana Bull, a real estate adviser with Compass in Marblehead, said she noticed more canceled contracts than usual in the spring.

Will the upcoming fall market see a flurry of activity, then? Not likely, experts said. Instead of a sea change, expect more of the same.

“We have some people coming over from the spring. They’ve taken a couple of breaks and stepped away from [the market] to go on vacation,” said Bull. “I think they’re going to really get back into it in the fall, but I don’t see any major shifts.”

Though there likely won’t be a dramatic shake-up, there are still ways buyers and sellers can remain competitive. For buyers, that’s putting the hunt for a forever home aside, and instead reconsidering a starter home. “Metro West is still moving fast, but smaller homes farther inbound are facing more headwinds and so present more opportunity, if you can make them work for now,” Ziegler said.

Those opportunities are very location-dependent, echoed Bull. “If you’re trying to buy in Andover, good luck … you’re gonna hit a lot of competition with that, right? But, say you wanted to buy a condo in Dorchester right now? I’d be like, ‘Let’s go. You’ll get your pick of the litter.’”

In April, MAR noted the monthly supply of inventory remained flat for single-family homes, but increased 13 percent from 2024 for condominium units. Then in June, the median sales price for single-family homes jumped 3.6 percent from the previous year to $725,000, but was down 1 percent to $579,000 for condos.

“Inventory has been steadily increasing with single-families, a little bit more so with condos,” Gustafson said. “So there’s no reason that we wouldn’t anticipate that to continue into the fall, based upon what we’ve seen historically.”

According to The Warren Group, which tracks Massachusetts banking and real estate data, the condo market had four months of inventory in May for the first time since 2011. “Though the number of sales was down, an increase in inventory helped hold prices down,” said Cassidy Norton, associate publisher and media relations director for The Warren Group.

Aside from condos and town homes, properties that need a little TLC could be the ticket to homeownership. Tariffs and their potential impact on supply chains and renovation costs are something to keep in mind, Ziegler noted.

“Properties that are move-in ready, especially recently renovated, are going to command a premium price as buyers get selective despite low inventory,” she said. By avoiding those properties altogether, you might have a better shot at finding a deal.

For sellers, this fall marks a time to have honest conversations with their agents about their priorities, whether that’s selling quickly or nabbing a high sales price. If sellers aren’t pricing aggressively, there may be more work to be done.

“With fewer ‘highly motivated’ buyers, sellers are needing to consider more intensive listing preparation, such as repairs or longer periods for showings,” Ziegler said.

The bottom line is that Massachusetts is still experiencing a housing shortage, Gustafson said. For the past several months, the state has seen just over 2.2 “months of supply,” which is the inventory of homes for sale at the end of a given month divided by the average monthly pending sales from the last 12 months, according to MAR.

“So even though things may be staying on the market a little bit longer and maybe prices aren’t going up as quickly … there comes a point where the prices are only rising at the rate that the people can support it, and we’re still in a critical housing shortage,” Gustafson said.