Published by REALTOR.com | November 11, 2022
All eyes have been glued to mortgage rates lately as those all-important fees continue their seemingly inexorable upward march.
While average rates for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage dipped to 6.95% last week, that figure climbed back to 7.08% for the week ending Nov. 10, according to Freddie Mac.
And if inflation refuses to budge, “mortgage rates are more likely to climb than to slip,” says Realtor.com® Chief Economist Danielle Hale in her analysis.
Yet while interest rates are up, nibbling away at affordability, at least another key metric is heading down to at least partly make up for it: home prices.
Indeed, the median list price for a typical home peaked at $450,000 in June, and has since dropped in October to $425,000. And home prices will likely continue downward toward the holidays, although perhaps not as low as many homebuyers might like.
“The typical asking price will near but not likely slip below $400,000 again this year. The housing market is resetting, but in a slow fashion.”
–Realtor.com® Chief Economist Danielle Hale
And while home prices have been decreasing month to month, they’re still higher than last year. For the week ending Nov. 10, home prices rose by 11.7% compared with the same week a year earlier.
That’s the 45th week straight of double-digit growth, although the pace has at least been ebbing, which means that home shoppers might not have to contend with double-digit price hikes much longer.
“Continuing at its recent pace of slowing, median listing price growth would move back into single-digit territory just before the end of the year,” says Hale.
