Existing home sales show 4 months of year-over-year growth 

Existing home sales posted another positive year-over-year print in October, marking the 4th straight month of year-over-year growth. Earlier in the year, I predicted that existing home sales would perform better than expected amid elevated mortgage rates. Since we were working with some of the lowest year-over-year comparisons in history from 2024, I anticipated growth from June to October in reports released from July to November. That’s because our weekly Housing Market Tracker data was performing better in the early months of the year even with elevated rates. 

The June data remained flat year over year, but subsequent months have shown positive year-over-year growth. Furthermore, mortgage rates are now even lower than the baseline data on which most of these reports were working from. I discussed the weekly demand data we track to better understand housing market trends in a recent episode of the HousingWire Daily podcast.

Now let’s take a look at the report.

Existing home sales for October

From NAR: “Home sales increased in October even with the government shutdown due to homebuyers taking advantage of lower mortgage rates,” said NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun.

Total existing-home sales for October:

• 1.2% increase in existing-home sales, month-over-month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.10 million.
• 1.7% increase in sales year-over-year.

It’s important to note that it doesn’t take much to move the needle when starting from the lowest levels of sales in history, especially once I adjust for population growth. As you can see in the chart below, we haven’t gone lower in sales since late 2022, but we haven’t really moved higher either.

Inventory in October

• 1.52 million units: Total housing inventory, down 0.7% from September and up 10.9% from October 2024 (1.37 million).
• 4.4-month supply of unsold inventory, down from 4.5 months in September and up from 4.1 months in October 2024.

Total active inventory peaked at approximately 1.55 million in 2025, and the seasonal decline has begun. I’ve been pleased with the inventory trends in 2025: we’ve returned to the levels seen before COVID-19, the days on market have grown and the market has achieved a better balance. For context, consider that during the housing bubble crisis, the active inventory peaked at 4 million in 2007, with monthly supply exceeding 10 months during the worst years of that cycle. Currently, we are at a supply level of 4.4 months.

Median sales price in October

From NAR, the median existing-home price for all housing types is $415,200, up 2.1% from one year ago ($406,800). This is the 28th consecutive month of year-over-year price increases.

Home price growth, according to NAR data, was cooling in the first seven months of the year. The year started with 3.9% year-over-year home price growth and moved all the way down toward 1% in July, but the last three months have picked up from the 1% growth level — coming in at 2.0% in August, 1.4% in September and today’s report — 2.1% year-over-year growth in October. The housing dynamics shifted mid-June with out tracker data, so it isn’t surprising that price growth picked up a tad.

Conclusion

Overall, today’s existing home sales report was good. Surprisingly, the government shutdown didn’t seem to impact the data significantly. In my work in housing, I consistently look for data variables that could boost and sustain sales. I’ve found that this tends to work best when mortgage rates drop below 6.64%, ideally to 6%. As we close the books on 2025, 2026 looks very interesting because mortgage rates aren’t spiking above 7% like they did toward the end of last year.