February 2025 existing-home sales
climbed 4.2% month over month, to a pace of 4.26 million in February. Despite the growth, this sales pace snapped the four-month streak of year-over-year gains, trailing 1.2% behind February 2024’s 4.31 million sales—a fairly high bar.
Pending home sales eased in both December and January, highlighting that mortgage rates continue to matter for home shoppers. When these homes with February closings generally went under contract, mortgage rates averaged 6.96% in January—their highest since May—and 6.84% in February—lower but still higher than any of the preceding six months. Despite the context of an expensive borrowing environment and stretched affordability for many shoppers, today’s pickup shows that a fair number of buyers and sellers are still able to find the middle ground that a transaction requires.
Home prices continue to climb despite falling list prices
The median home sales price continued to move higher, rising 3.8% compared with one year ago, a modest deceleration from the 4.7% annual growth rate in 2024. This mirrors softer median home listing price trends, which trailed the pace from a year ago, according to Realtor.com housing data for February.
What this data means for what’s ahead this year
Home sales are expected to exceed 2024’s long-term low, according to the Realtor.com 2025 Housing Forecast. While February sales slipped behind their year-ago pace, settling mortgage rates are teeing up the possibility of a reverse of 2024’s rate trend, which could be a positive for the busy late spring and early summer sales season, which will set the tone for 2025.
In 2024, mortgage rates generally climbed from January through May, thwarting the optimism that home shoppers had in the heart of the spring homebuying season. So far in 2025, we saw a mortgage rate peak in January that is likely contributing to the sluggish sales start, but this has tempered buyer expectations. This could mean better home sale prospects as we approach the busy spring season, especially if mortgage rates continue to relent.
And what’s ahead for homebuyers and sellers this spring
A recent Realtor.com report identifies the Best Time To Sell as just a month away–April 13–19–because home sellers can typically count on more buyer interest early in the season before it is spread thin across a greater number of sellers. This leads to lower time on the market and higher than average asking prices for sellers, just some of the advantages of listing early in the spring.