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Here are the basics – the ARMLS numbers for April 1, 2025 compared with April 1, 2024 for all areas & types:
- Active Listings: 24,990 versus 17,025 last year – up 47% – and up 4.4% from 23,934 last month
- Pending Listings: 5,278 versus 5,185 last year – up 1.8% – and up 5% from 5,028 last month
- Under Contract Listings: 9,113 versus 8,601 last year – up 6.0% – and up 7.6% from 8,471 last month
- Monthly Sales: 6,939 versus 6,765 last year – up 2.6% – but up 19% from 5,816 last month
- Monthly Average Sales Price per Sq. Ft.: $311.19 versus $294.09 last year – up 5.8% – but down 0.2% from $311.80 last month
- Monthly Median Sales Price: $459,500 versus $445,000 last year – up 3.3% – and up 0.1% from $459,000 last month
There were 21 working days in both March 2025 and March 2024, so we do not need to make any calendar-based adjustments.
There is good news and bad news for both sellers and buyers.
The active listing counts continue to rise, which is very unusual between March and April, and therefore bad news for sellers, but the rate of increase has at least slowed down. Interest rates have eased to around 6.63% for the 30 year fixed, and demand shows clear signs of improving during March. Pending listings are higher than last year and listings under contract are up over 6%. The sales count is also stronger (up 2.6% from March 2024). This is encouraging for sellers. The problem remains that even with this higher transaction and contract level, supply is still rising. There are simply more sellers than we expected, with year-to-date new listings almost 20% higher than this time last year.
Closed pricing is still looking surprisingly strong but once again this is heavily skewed by high-end deals that were agreed before pandemonium hit the stock market. The luxury market is highly dependent on how wealthy people feel about their investments, and they have gone from ebullient in early January to despondent in early April. This change is not reflected in closings, but it appears to be making itself felt in active list pricing and under contract counts for the top end of the market.
With the Cromford® Market Index now below 80, the downward pressure on prices is building just as inflation starts to tick up again. The cost of building a home is rising quickly because so many of the physical components are sourced from abroad, but new home selling prices will have to come down when supply exceeds demand to the extent we are now seeing. Despite new home closings in Greater Phoenix reaching the highest level for January and February since 2006, home builders are starting to cut their base prices – KB Home being the first major builder to report doing so. Other builders may be hoping that increasing concessions will work, but just one look at the stock charts for homebuilders is enough to paint the picture clearly. Lennar is currently down 32% over the past 12 months and DR Horton is down 22%. Even Toll Brothers, operating at a much higher median price point, is down 22% from a year ago.
Although there are more buyers about at the moment, they have a lot of choice and growing bargaining power, especially in the outlying and less expensive areas. With patience and care, they should be able to secure a good deal if the seller is realistic about market conditions. If the seller is unrealistic, there is no harm in walking away.
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