January ’24 Housing Market Update: Home Prices & Inventory Down in Typical Winter Market

There’s a lot of red on this month’s market update graphic. Is it cause for alarm? I don’t think so. There was a lot of red on the January 2023 graphic, too. That’s just the way the winter housing market goes. There’s less activity, fewer homes for sale, and prices usually drop as demand drops.

January’s numbers are a good benchmark, though, to help us understand where the market is at the start of the year, and where it might be headed. So let’s take a closer look at what’s happening this month!

Tri-Cities Home Prices

Probably the most notable thing to report is that median home prices dropped by almost $17K and now sit just below $400,000. That’s a 9.6% drop month-over-month. But it’s only down 2.7% from one year ago. Housing prices in this area continue to hold pretty steady overall.

In fact, this drop down to $399,027 breaks a string of 11 straight months with prices holding between $415,000 and $435,000. But if you extend the window a bit wider, median prices have stayed between $399K and $450K for the past two years.

Kennewick home prices were about $430K back in September, but have dropped for four straight months since. Out in West Richland, it’s been 11 months since the median price dipped below $400K.

Pasco was the only local city to see a bump in prices this month.

Sales Activity

As usually happens this time of year, sales activity is slowing down. We had 214 homes close last month, the lowest total since last March. If history is any indicator, this will continue for another month or two. BUT…with interest rates going down, we might see buyers come into the market sooner than normal.

Those homes are selling more slowly, too. Our median days on market last month was 25, while the average DOM was 49.

Tri-Cities Home Inventory

There were 756 homes for sale when we did our snapshot on January 7. That’s down 8% from December. But it’s 23% more than our inventory one year ago, so that’s a good sign for buyers.

Based on what we’ve seen in recent non-Covid years, I won’t be surprised if inventory continues to drop until about April.

And that’s a look at this month’s Tri-Cities housing market! As always, please drop us a note if you ever have questions about what’s happening around town or in your specific neighborhood.

(*Remember that days on market can sometimes be skewed by how new construction homes are processed in the MLS.)