New Jersey Real Estate Report

From Redfin:

Nearly 1 in 7 Home Sales Are Falling Through, a Record For This Time of Year

Nearly 40,000 home-sale agreements nationwide were canceled in January, equal to 13.7% of homes that went under contract that month. That’s up from 13.1% a year earlier, and the highest January share in records dating back to 2017.

This is based on a Redfin analysis of MLS pending-sales data. The data is seasonal; typically, there’s a higher share of cancellations at the end of the year and a lower share in the spring. That’s why we compare this January to past Januarys. Please note: Homes that fell out of contract during a given month didn’t necessarily go under contract that same month. This data is subject to revision. 

Sales are falling through at a higher rate than in the past largely because it’s a buyer’s market, with hundreds of thousands more U.S. home sellers than buyers. That gives buyers negotiating power; they may back out during the inspection period if they see a home they like better or an inspection issue arises. 

Another major reason buyers are backing out of deals is financial uncertainty. While housing costs have come down from their peak, they are still near historic highs. Some would-be buyers are canceling purchases because they’re getting jittery about buying a house when they’re anxious about things like layoffs, tariffs and geopolitical tensions.

“More buyers are backing out,” said Alin Glogovicean, a Redfin Premier agent in Los Angeles, where 16.7% of home purchase agreements were cancelled in January, up from 15% a year earlier. “They’re second-guessing the wisdom of making a huge purchase when there’s a fear in the back of their mind about the state of the economy and the uncertainty of their finances. That’s particularly true when they’re first-time buyers who don’t have equity from a previous home sale, and they’re using most or all of their savings on a down payment.”

In San Antonio, more than one in five (21.2%) home-purchase agreements were canceled in January, the highest share of the 47 major U.S. metros Redfin analyzed. It’s followed by Atlanta (18.5%) and Cleveland (17.9%). Riverside, CA (17.5%) and Orlando, FL (17.3%) round out the top five. 

As requested.

From the NYT:

The Housing Market Is Tilting Back Toward Buyers

Rukmini Callimachi, who covers real estate, polled five housing economists to report this story.

On the windswept coast of North Carolina, Ron Hertrich has spent months trying — and failing — to sell his parents’ 40-year-old beach house. He scrubbed off the old paint and repainted the walls a warm “shiitake beige.” He replaced the furniture, including a glass-top dining table with rattan legs, with something more modern.

When that didn’t work, he offered a $10,000 cash “incentive” that a prospective buyer could use as they pleased.

Despite all this, the condo — which sits 100 yards from the water line — has become a monument to the shifting tides of the real estate market. After just two showings in two months, his real estate agent advised him to take new pictures in an effort to relaunch the listing this spring.

The same thing happened hundreds of miles away in Atlanta, where Aimée Berry, 56, put her furniture in storage and lived in a perpetual state of readiness, only for a total of six people to come see her one-bedroom condo in six months.

“It was depressing,” she said, explaining that she too was advised to take her home off the market.

From Housingwire:

Case-Shiller data shows real home price returns turned negative in 2025

Annual home price growth continued to cool at the end of 2025, according to the S&P Cotality Case-Shiller Index released on Tuesday. 

The national home price index came in at a reading of 327.36 in December, reflecting a 1.3% year-over-year increase, down from the 1.4% yearly increase recorded in November. On a monthly basis, prior to seasonal adjustment, the national index was down 0.3%. 

According to the release, inflation outpaced home price growth throughout the second half of 2025, reversing a decade-long trend of positive real returns on home prices. Overall, national home prices grew just 1.3% in 2025, marking the weakest full-year gain since 2011, when prices dropped 3.9%. Additionally, this is 5.3 percentage points below the 6.6% 10-year annual average. 

“Two structural forces have reshaped the market over recent years: mortgage rates and inflation. The 30-year mortgage rate closed 2025 at 6.2%, well above the 4.8% 10-year average and a sharp contrast to the 3.9% average that prevailed from 2016 through 2020,” Nicholas Godec, the head of fixed income tradables and commodities at S&P Dow Jones Indices, said in a statement. “ Meanwhile, annual inflation for 2025 came in at 2.7% — modestly below the 3.1% 10-year average — but still outpaced home price appreciation by 1.4 percentage points, effectively eroding real home values for most owners. This marks a notable reversal: Over the prior decade, national home prices outpaced inflation by 3.7 percentage points annually, a dynamic that has quietly reversed, with real home price returns turning negative in June 2025.”

The 10-city index also recorded slower annual home price growth in December, jumping 1.9% on a yearly basis to 357.32, while the 20-city index rose 1.4% year-over-year, the same as a month prior, to a reading of 336.89. Prior to seasonal adjustment, both indexes were down 0.1% month-over-month. 

Of the 20 cities indexed, Chicago reported the highest annual price gain at 5.3% in December, followed by New York (5.1%) and Cleveland (4.0%). At the other end of the spectrum, Tampa reported the largest annual decline dropping 2.85%, followed by Denver (-2.06%) and Phoenix (-1.53%).