The higher hopes for existing-home sales in June unfortunately were not met as the National Association of Realtors® (NAR) reported a decrease. However, not all hope is lost as several indicators in NAR’s data remain positive, and economists say there is still potential for a better path ahead.
NAR’s Existing-Home Sales report saw sales fall 2.4% to a rate of 4.09 million in June. This is a reversal from the 3.2% increase to a rate of 4.17 million seen in May (later upwardly revised to 4.19 million), which NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun had characterized at the time as the “highest level since December.”
“The back-and-forth in monthly home sales activity, driven by mild fluctuations in mortgage rates, shows how sensitive homebuyers are to affordability conditions,” said Yun. “However, job gains—more than half a million since the beginning of the year—will continue to provide support for the housing market.”
The aforementioned high hopes for existing-home sales this month came after positive pending home-sales data was released for May, given that April’s boost in pending sales led to an increase in existing sales in May. Yun, however, noted that pending data is always just “suggestive” of what may appear in closing data.
Yun also noted that high hopes had rested on June because it is typically “the bread and butter month for real estate sales,” meaning it is usually “the peak in terms of raw home-sales activity that happens in every year.”
That being said, existing-home sales were up 2.8% year-over-year in June, as they were the month prior as well (by 3.2%), with Yun adding that “overall momentum appears to be slightly better compared to one year ago.”
Looking at housing types, single-family existing-home sales were down 2.4% in June to a rate of 3.73 million, but were up 3.3% year-over-year. Condo and co-op sales were down 2.7% month-over-month and year-over-year to a rate of 360,000.
Regionally, while the Northeast was a positive outlier month-over-month as the three other regions were negative, all four regions were either unchanged or improved year-over-year. The Northeast was up 2.1% month-over-month and unchanged year-over-year to a rate of 480,000. The Midwest was down 3% month-over-month to a rate of 980,000, but was up 2.1% year-over-year. The South was down 3.6% month-over-month to a rate of 1.89 million, but was up 3.8% year-over-year. Lastly, the West was down 1.3% month-over-month to a rate of 740,000, but was up 2.8% year-over-year.
Yun noted that NAR’s revisions of prior month’s data “has been consistently a little bit positive” and upward, “which means that any late data that is coming in is coming from a stronger market condition.”
Inventory has been a big headline of existing-home sales reports in recent months, as it saw consistent growth for four consecutive months from February to May. This streak was broken in June’s data, however, as existing home inventory slipped 0.6% month-over-month to 1.56 million units.
Not all bad news, though, as inventory is still up 1.3% year-over-year. Additionally, the current sales pace sits at 4.6 months, up from 4.5 last month and unchanged from one year ago.
Realtor.com®’s Chief Economist Danielle Hale also noted that delistings (sellers pulling listings off the market without selling them), which she explained have been a “sign of seller frustration with the market,” were down 10%.
“Seller expectations appear to be better aligned with buyers so far in 2026,” she said.
Even with some shifts in other stats, affordability continued to improve this month, with NAR’s Housing Affordability Index up from 95.5 a year ago to 102.3 in June. The index also improved year-over-year across all four regions: the Northeast was up 4.5%, the Midwest was up 6.2%, the South was up 8.3% and the West was up 8.9%.
The median home price was up 1.8% year-over-year to $440,600. This is an upward trend from last month’s 1.3% increase, but Yun noted that “home prices in the month of June are always essentially the highest of the year, and therefore, it makes it less affordable compared to the prior month and condition.”
Yun also explained that despite upward movement in home-price growth, “affordability is ever so slightly improving” as wage growth—which sits at 3.5%—is outpacing home-price growth.
He added, however, that progress on housing affordability long-term could be “hampered if inventory growth continues to stall.”
“Without consistent gains in inventory, home prices can accelerate,” Yun continued. “It is critical to introduce more supply to the market to widen the opportunity for homeownership.”
For continued improvement, Yun said we need to see “30%, 40% growth in inventory.”
Overall, NewHomeSource (the consumer portal for Zonda) Chief Economist Ali Wolf said that this report “reflects the uncertainty in the overall market.”
“Discretionary buyers who have the flexibility to pause their buying plans will stay in this holding pattern until they feel conditions are more stable,” she said. “Sellers, too, may be more cautious about listing their homes, and the combined effect is putting a damper on sales.”
Wolf concluded that until buyers and sellers gain more confidence, “both sides are likely to stay cautious, and sales activity may stay subdued.”
