June 2026 Housing Market Update: Spring Sales Activity Stays Strong

About 2-3 weeks ago, I was looking at sales numbers for the month of May. It didn’t look great. But in our market, a lot of sales close at the end of every month. That was definitely the case last month, because we ended up with an 11% rise in sales for the month.

That’s just one of the things that stands out in this month’s market update, so let’s get into the data and what it means.

Tri-Cities Home Sales

We had 357 closings in May, which you can see above is an 11% gain from April. What’s noteworthy is that, since a low of 202 sales in January, we’ve had four straight months with a double-digit increase in sales activity.

This is happening despite challenges that are impacting other markets — namely, uncertainty due to the Iraq war, higher consumer prices, and mortgage rates being near their highest levels of the year. Despite all that, Tri-Cities buyers and sellers are staying active.

In May 2025, we had 320 sales, so last month’s total represents a 12% gain year over year.

How long is it taking to sell right now?

Sales picked up the pace a bit in May. Homes that closed last month spent a median of 22 days on market, faster than 29 DOM in April. But average days on market didn’t change as much, going from 64 in April to 58 last month.

The upper half of the market is taking noticeably longer to sell. Homes that sold for $500,000 or more spent a median of 28 days on market, while homes below that price sold in just 19 days.

Home Prices

This month shows the influence that Kennewick has on the overall market. As you can see on the chart above, all of the larger cities saw prices go down by at least $10,000 in May. But overall, Tri-Cities home prices fell just $3,320. That’s because home prices in Kennewick, which every month sees the most activity, were up a whopping $29,000 for the month! If Kennewick prices had only gone up a couple thousand dollars, or had dropped like the rest of the area, we would’ve seen a more substantial overall drop in prices.

As it stands, we’re now at four straight months with Tri-Cities home prices above $440,000. In 2025, there were only two months all year when prices went above that level, and in 2024 there were none.

Inventory of Homes for Sale

There were 1,119 homes for sale when we did our market snapshot on June 8 — up 2% for the month. We also had a 2% rise in inventory between April and May.

But this is worth watching, because new listings were down 9% in May compared to April. That means our 2% increase in homes for sale is mainly due to unsold homes staying on the market, not new homes coming to market.

To sum up: Sales activity continues to chug along in the Tri-Cities with four consecutive months of double-digit gains in homes sold. That’s a healthy sign especially in light of all the external economic factors that could impact home buyers. We also saw our fourth straight month with home prices above $440,000, but that’s mainly due to a sharp rise in Kennewick prices that offset lower prices just about everywhere else.

As always, please get in touch if you have questions about what’s happening around town or in your specific neighborhood. Use the TEXT US tool below to send a text, call us at (509) 392-4705, or contact me via email — whatever’s best for you!

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