Nationwide, 44.6% of home offers written by Redfin agents faced competition on a seasonally adjusted basis in August, the lowest bidding-war rate since the beginning of the pandemic when the housing market nearly ground to a halt. It’s down from 63.5% a year earlier and a revised rate of 47.2% in July, and marks the seventh-straight monthly decline.
An offer is considered part of a bidding war if a Redfin agent reported that it received at least one competing bid. The statistics in this analysis are subject to revision. Data below on property type and metro area is not seasonally adjusted. Redfin’s bidding-war data goes back through April 2020.
The typical home in a bidding war received 3.2 offers in August, compared with 3.5 one month earlier and 5 one year earlier, according to data submitted by Redfin agents nationwide.
The bidding-war rate is falling as the housing market cools and buyers back off from the pandemic-driven homebuying frenzy in 2021 and early 2022, with the number of home sales down nearly 20% year over year.
Buyers are dropping out of the market and competition is dwindling largely because mortgage rates have doubled from a year ago, reaching 6% in mid-September. The increase in rates makes buying a home much more expensive: A buyer purchasing a $400,000 home has a monthly mortgage payment of roughly $2,500 with today’s 6% mortgage rate, up from $2,000 with last year’s 3% rates.
Redfin agents report that many prospective buyers have backed off because they can’t afford the high monthly payments that come with 6%-plus mortgage rates.
Persistent inflation, which is still near its 40-year high, and a slumping stock market are also cutting into Americans’ budgets and causing buyers to back off. And some prospective buyers have decided not to purchase a home because they’re worried home values will fall.
The good news for buyers is that even though they’re paying higher mortgage rates than they were last year, they’re less likely to face competition and homes are priced slightly lower than they were at the peak of the market. And sellers can still get a fair price if they’re realistic and understand that the market has slowed down.
“The worst thing a seller can do right now is price their home too high, and the best thing they can do is price just below market value to catch buyers’ interest,” said Miami listing agent Sam Chute. “Resourceful sellers understand that the market is intertwined with rising mortgage rates. Buyers aren’t going to pay extreme amounts of money or waive contingencies like they did last year, but they will pay a fair price for a nice home.”
Just over one in five (21.7%) of home offers submitted by Redfin agents in San Antonio, TX faced competition in August, the lowest share of the 36 metros in this analysis.
Tampa, FL had the second-lowest bidding-war rate, with 23.8% of offers facing competition, followed by Olympia, WA (24.2%), Phoenix (26.4%) and Minneapolis (27%). Tampa, Olympia (part of the greater Seattle metro) and Phoenix are all among the 20 U.S. housing markets cooling fastest this year after attracting scores of homebuyers during the pandemic.
To be included in this analysis, metros must have had a monthly average of at least 50 offers submitted by Redfin agents from March 2021 to March 2022. Scroll down to the bottom of this report to see a table with data on all 36 metros.
Philadelphia, where 61.7% of offers faced competition, had the highest bidding-war rate. It’s followed by San Jose (58%), Providence, RI (54.5%), Boston (54%) and Detroit (52.9%).
The bidding-war rate has declined most in Raleigh, NC, where 35.4% of home offers faced competition in August, down from 78.9% a year earlier. It’s followed by San Antonio, where 59.8% of offers faced competition last year.
Charlotte, NC (31.4%, down from 68.8%), Olympia, WA (24.2%, down from 60.7%) and Colorado Springs, CO (29.7%, down from 62.5%) round out the five metros where competition has dropped most.
The bidding-war rate declined in all 36 metros in this analysis except Philadelphia, the metro with the highest rate. The rate there is up from 60.2% a year ago.
Offers for townhouses were more likely than other property types to encounter competition, with 44.1% of Redfin offers facing bidding wars. They were followed by single-family homes (42.1%), multi-family properties (40.2%) and condos (37%).
Townhouses are popular in today’s pricey housing market because they’re typically smaller and more affordable than single-family homes.
This table is sorted by lowest to highest bidding-war rates in August 2022
