Sacramento Appraisal Blog - Market trends and real estate appraisals for divorce, estate settlement, loans, property tax appeal, pre-listing and more. We cover Sacramento, Placer and Yolo County. We're professional, courteous and timely.

Gone are the days of getting a gazillion offers

May 8, 2025 By Ryan Lundquist 10 Comments

Getting ten offers was so 2021. Today, you might only get one. Or maybe two. But then again, zero if you’re overpriced. I have some brief stats today, and I hope they resonate and help build expectations for today’s housing market.

UPCOMING SPEAKING GIGS:

5/8/25 Empire Home Loans (register here for today’s event)
5/13/25 PCAR
5/21/25 Grounded Real Estate
6/5/25 Auburn Marketing Meeting
6/12/25 Realtist of Sacramento
9/16/25 Culbertson & Gray (private)
9/26/25 PCAR
9/30/25 Elk Grove Regional MLS Meeting
10/15/25 EDH Coldwell Banker (private)
10/21/25 Orangevale MLS Meeting
11/4/25 SAR Main Meeting

BE HAPPY WITH ONE ‘CUZ YOU MIGHT NOT GET MORE

Gone are the days of getting a gazillion offers. Over the past week of pendings, 56.6% of homes had only one offer in the Sacramento region per MLS data, and 79.9% had one or two. In short, the vast bulk of properties (that get into contract) are going to have just one or two offers at most. In short, if you are priced right, the hope today is to get one to two offers. Not 5 or 10.

GETTING ZERO OFFERS

There are about 4,000 active listings right now with zero offers in the Sacramento region, which is important to talk about. We don’t want to get so fixated on what’s happening with pendings that we forget to think about these properties. The number of listings has definitely increased lately. We’re not back to normal levels, but sales are still really low, so the market is definitely feeling the extra listings.

FLAT PRICE VIBES

It was slightly too early to push out my big monthly recap this week, so I’ll do that next week. For now, I wanted to share some stats to help show how flat the market has been. We’ve been talking about this for many months, and it’s what the stats are showing year-over-year. More next week.

UNICORN SITUATIONS STILL HAPPEN

Look, there are still situations with a ton of offers. I get it. There was one this week with 21 offers. All I’m saying is that’s unicorn territory that doesn’t represent the rest of the market. By the way, the property with 21 offers was a cosmetic fixer in Sacramento priced below $290,000.

FRUSTRATION FOR BUYERS IS REAL

Buyers have more power today, and there is a greater chance of being able to get concessions from the seller too, but there is still decent competition out there for the good stuff. I was at an open house last Friday night in my neighborhood, and while I was talking to the agent for about thirty minutes, there were five other people who came through the house. This property just listed last week, and it’s now pending with two offers. All I’m saying is buyers are very patient and picky today (rightly so), but they’re ready to act quickly when the right house hits the market. This is why it feels competitive out there…. for the good stuff anyway.

STATS TO USE ON SOCIAL MEDIA THIS WEEK

3,835 active listings do not have any offers
38.5% of current actives have had a price reduction
Price reductions have ranged from $1 to $800K for active listings
27.4% of pendings over the past two weeks had a price drop before getting into contract
Price drops ranged from $2,131 to $275,000 for properties that went pending over the past two weeks
56.6% of pendings this week had one offer
79.9% of pendings had one or two offers this week
Only 5.1% of pendings had more than five offers
1.3% of pendings had ten or more offers

Stats based on single family detached units in MLS as of 5/7/25 (Sac, Placer, Yolo, El Dorado). Please cite me with the stats. Thanks.

Thanks for being here.

DATA: Yes, our local MLS has a field that shows the number of offers as well as a “yes” or “no” multiple offers field.

LEAVING COMMENTS: The captcha is not working perfectly. If you open up a new browser, that should solve the issue. It’s been a problem to comment when clicking from my weekly email. My apologies.

Questions: Why are some properties generating offers and others nothing at all? I’d love to hear your take on things.

If you liked this post, subscribe by email (or RSS). Thanks for being here.

Sellers are coming back faster than buyers

May 1, 2025 By Ryan Lundquist 8 Comments

The best way to describe the housing market is sellers are coming back faster than buyers. It’s simply easier to list a home than buy a home today. And this is why the housing temperature has changed. Let’s do a deep dive today into supply vs demand, and I suspect many areas around the country can relate to this.

UPCOMING SPEAKING GIGS:

5/8/25 Empire Home Loans (register here)
5/13/25 PCAR
5/21/25 Grounded Real Estate
6/5/25 Auburn Marketing Meeting
6/12/25 Realtist of Sacramento
9/16/25 Culbertson & Gray (private)
9/26/25 PCAR
9/30/25 Elk Grove Regional MLS Meeting
10/15/25 EDH Coldwell Banker (private)
10/21/25 Orangevale MLS Meeting
11/4/25 SAR Main Meeting

SUPPLY IS THE GATEWAY TO MORE SALES

Sometimes people freak out when hearing about more supply hitting the market, but it’s important to realize more supply is the gateway to getting more sales. I’ve been talking about this lately with my friend Geoff Black, and I wanted to give him props for the gateway language. Anyway, if we continue to see the pile of listings grow faster than the pile of sales, that could put downward pressure on prices, which could eventually bring more buyers into the market. Only time will tell how the market unfolds, but more supply is what we want to see. And for my real estate friends, today is all about mindset. If you are struggling about the market changing, my advice is to figure out how you can see opportunities instead of negatives.

MISSING 35,000 LISTINGS

This is the x-factor for why prices have not dropped heavily in recent years. Over the past three years we’ve seen about 35,000 sellers NOT list their homes. This visual compares the number of new listings with the pre-2020 average. Imagine how different the market would feel if we had all that extra supply. And do you see how the trend is improving? We’re starting to get more listings, so we are not as far from the norm today.

Here’s a different way to look at the same thing. The dotted line represents the pre-2020 average, and the blue line is what we’ve seen happen.

SELLERS ARE REALLY STARTING TO THAW OUT

The number of listings today is still historically low, but it’s notably different than last year, and the market really feels it. Do you see sellers thawing out in these stats?

THERE WERE 10,000 MORE ACTIVE LISTINGS IN 2008

There is so much comparison to 2008 right now, but back then we had about 10,000 extra active listings, which is why prices were able to drop so quickly. Sometimes people accuse me of sugarcoating when I share stuff like this, but this is math. The reason prices haven’t plummeted in recent years despite glaring affordability issues is we haven’t had a huge imbalance between supply and demand.

IT’S EASIER TO BE A SELLER THAN A BUYER

Lifestyle needs are happening more readily for sellers before the math is working for buyers. In other words, lifestyle changes are compelling sellers more than affordability is working for buyers.

NO LONGER AT THE LOWEST LEVEL EVER

Here’s a different way to look at the number of active listings. We are now beating the previous four years, which is nice to see. In 2023, we hit the lowest level of listings we’ve seen in decades. It’s worth noting that sellers are NOT rushing the market like some people think, but we are seeing very healthy growth since the low point two years ago. We’re just feeling the extra growth in the market since the number of buyers hasn’t kept up.

MORE SALES HAPPENING IN 2025 (TRUE STORY)

There have actually been more sales in 2025 so far compared to 2024. This is probably being overshadowed by larger growth with listings, but this is positive news. I know it’s barely more than one year ago, but more is what we want to see.

WAITING FOR VOLUME TO EXPLODE

The strange part about today is we’ve had depressed volume for longer than what we saw during the Great Financial Crisis. Back then, market volume peaked in August 2005, and after 2.3 years we started to see a huge increase in volume again due to a massive climb in supply that led to prices dropping very quickly. I get that there were other differences then, but today we’ve had depressed volume for nearly 3 years with just a little bit of growth. I think many people have been saying things like, “volume change precedes price change,” and I completely get that. But we have to concede that prices today have remained higher because we’ve had tens of thousands of sellers not list their homes.

SELLERS ARE WAKING UP FASTER THAN BUYERS

The biggest story today is sellers have been outpacing buyers. We’ve had about 19% more new listings from January to April compared to last year at the same time, but just slightly more sales. In actual numbers, there have been about 1,500 extra new listings this year compared to 100+ extra closed sales. Do you see why the market feels different in 2025?

Thanks for being here.

Questions: What stands out to you about the stats above? I’d love to hear your take on things.

If you liked this post, subscribe by email (or RSS). Thanks for being here.

Weak does NOT describe the high-end market

April 22, 2025 By Ryan Lundquist 16 Comments

The housing market has some of the worst sales numbers we’ve ever seen, but that’s not the vibe at the very highest prices. Today, I want to talk about the strength we’re seeing in the luxury market in Sacramento, and I’d love to hear from others around the country. Are you seeing a similar dynamic?

NOTE: For those who subscribe by WordPress, you may have gotten a bunch of emails from me yesterday. This was a WordPress issue outside of my control, and I don’t know why it happened. Sorry that it did though.

UPCOMING SPEAKING GIGS:

4/24/25 KW EDH (register here)
4/28/25 Socotra Capital (Zoom)
4/30/25 Anthony James Office Meeting (private)
5/8/25 Empire Home Loans (details TBA)
5/13/25 PCAR
5/21/25 Grounded Real Estate
6/5/25 Auburn Marketing Meeting
6/12/25 Realtist of Sacramento
9/26/25 PCAR
11/4/25 SAR Main Meeting

THE TOP IS A DIFFERENT ANIMAL

Buyers at the very highest prices are less sensitive to mortgage rates around 7%, so volume has been stronger through the years compared to so many other ranges that are down 30% or more from the pre-2020 normal level. If anything, the luxury market locally has awakened in recent years with so much new construction in places like Loomis, Granite Bay, and El Dorado Hills. This is a good reminder that not all parts of the market have the same exact trend.

FLEXING AT THE TOP IN 2025

Volume in 2025 so far has been strong above $1.5M in the Sacramento region over the past few years. Keep in mind early 2022 had strong volume for the entire market before rates doubled soon afterward. By the way, El Dorado Hills has the most sales since 2019 above $1.5M.

Above $2M in the region:

And above $3M in the Sacramento region. As we can see, there aren’t many sales at this range, but it’s been a strong year at this price point.

HOW MANY OFFERS DOES THE HIGH END GET?

It depends. The average number of offers in Q1 above $1.5M is 1.6 offers, but the higher you go in price, there aren’t going to be as many offers. 59% of the time, properties got one offer, and about 84% of the time there were 1-2 offers. In short, getting 1-2 is the general expectation (if you get any offers at all).

HIGHER PRICES GROWING MORE THAN LOWER

When looking at all price ranges, we’ve seen obvious growth at the top in the region above $800K. Yet, a massive portion of the market is below this amount, which is key to understand. Think about it this way. Above $1.5M was only 2.5% of all sales in the region in Q1 2025. And above $2M was only 0.8%.

THE MARKET IS NOT IMMUNE

Right now there is a ton of uncertainty in real estate, and it’s worth nothing the upper-end market is not immune from what is happening in the world (even though that demographic tends to be less sensitive to what is happening with mortgage rates). We definitely want to watch how growing economic uncertainty and the stock market could affect the highest prices. So, I’m writing about strength in this sliver of the market, but we need to continue to watch the trend.

THERE IS A NEW LUXURY LEADER IN TOWN (LOOMIS)

When looking at $3M and above, nobody beats Loomis for the number of sales at this level. Granite Bay still has the all-time record for sales above $3M since 1998, but Loomis has become quite the luxury haven over the past few years. Does anything surprise you about the list below?

Here’s a breakdown of sales above $3M since 2020. Keep in mind this includes MLS sales only – not private sales. There are a few Tahoe properties in there, but they don’t make a real difference in the stats. The % represents the category’s portion to the entire market. So, Granite Bay was home to 19.9% of all sales in the region above $3M since 2020.

GOING ABOVE AND BELOW

Let’s look at how properties above $1.5M sold compared to their original price. The story is definitely NOT the same for every escrow since it hinges on the credibility of the original price. 22.9% sold above, 63.9% sold below, and 13.2% sold at the original asking price (Q1 2025).

And in case you wanted to see the dollar amount too. Some properties sold about $200K above their original price, but others sold $400,000 below. One property closed $3.5M below the original asking price, and that sounds like a really viral headline, but meh. It was obviously priced way too high.

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO SELL AT THE TOP?

Some properties go very quickly within the first two weeks, but there are others that sit on the market for hundreds of days. I think sometimes sellers at this range are testing out unicorn prices, and maybe they don’t even need to sell, so there is sometimes less urgency about actually attracting a buyer. The longer you’re on the market, the lower you tend to sell from the original price. This is a constant theme we see at all price points.

LOCATIONS AREN’T THE SAME

Above one million isn’t really a luxury price point for many areas, but I wanted to show the amount of the market that sold above this threshold in the first quarter of 2025. I dig this visual. It’s the first time I made it, and I hope it resonates. If not, it’ll be the last time I make it. Haha.

A LAST SUPER IMPORTANT NOTE

This is nerd stuff, but it’s so important for anyone talking about home prices. If there are more sales at the top of a market, could that affect the median price or average price? Yes, it can. For instance, in 2025 we’ve seen notable growth in the region above $600K, and that could essentially pull up the median price some. So, when we see price metrics showing growth on paper, some of that is more sales at the top of the market. This is exactly why we want to understand what is happening in various price ranges so we can have informed discussion.

My advice? Look to traditional metrics such as the median price, average price, and average price per sq ft (I publish those every month). Also, look to see what published price indexes like the one below show. And most of all, look to the comps to unpack the neighborhood trend. In short, it’s important to juggle lots of different numbers as we try to understand what the market is doing. What we don’t want to do is put all of our eggs in one basket.

Speaking of price indexes, check out Sacramento below. I’ve been talking about the flat market for a while, and I think Zillow’s index is reflecting that sentiment in their index. Traditional metrics have still been up a few percent at most in the region, but some individual counties are very flat just like this. Frankly, this image is probably something to show sellers who are struggling with pricing too high.

Thanks for being here.

Questions: What stands out to you about the higher-end market?

If you liked this post, subscribe by email (or RSS). Thanks for being here.

When concessions stop working

April 16, 2025 By Ryan Lundquist 6 Comments

Concessions are a tractor beam to entice buyers. Until they’re not. At some point they simply stop working, and prices have to be lowered. Let’s talk about this, and I have some new visuals to show which price points are growing and shrinking.

FIVE BEERS ON ME TONIGHT

I’m recording a live podcast in Downtown Sacramento tonight from 6:30-7:30pm. Want to join the audience? It’s at a brewery, and I’d like to buy a beer (or NA drink) for five people who come.

UPCOMING SPEAKING GIGS:

4/16/25 Enlightenment Podcast (live event)
4/18/25 Prime Real Estate (private)
4/24/25 KW EDH (register here)
4/28/25 Socotra Capital (Zoom)
4/30/25 Anthony James Office Meeting (private)
5/8/25 Empire Home Loans (details TBA)
5/13/25 PCAR
5/21/25 Grounded Real Estate
6/5/25 Auburn Marketing Meeting
6/12/25 Realtist of Sacramento
9/26/25 PCAR
11/4/25 SAR Main Meeting

HAVE CONCESSIONS STOPPED WORKING?

New home sales have been lackluster for two months in a row in the Sacramento region, so concessions just aren’t doing what they used to do to attract buyers. And I get it. Between higher rates and economic uncertainty, some prospective buyers are on the sidelines. When looking at both February and March sales volume, it’s been a low couple of months. While it’s not awful volume, it’s a clear departure from the glowing trend in recent years. This is going to be interesting to watch ahead, and what happens with consumer sentiment and rates will play a huge role.

DROP THE PRICE IF NEEDED

A couple months ago I wrote about the housing market’s purple pill. The dream is to keep the price high while offering a credit, but buyers are extremely picky today about price, so they may want a reduction AND a credit. In other words, take the purple pill (combined red and blue). This goes for new homes and the resale market. Drop the price if needed.

GIVING MORE INCENTIVES IN 2025

This is just one builder, but Lennar is one of the largest builders in the country. We’ve seen a higher dollar amount of incentives in 2025 compared to 2024. Image from JBREC. Interesting data, right?

NO LONGER A CAPTIVE AUDIENCE

New construction has had a captive audience since sellers stepped back from the resale market, but we’re starting to see more sellers come back, so buyers have more selection. This means new construction simply doesn’t have as much attention.

ONE THING TO WATCH

If builders do lower their prices, that could affect what consumers are willing to pay for nearby homes in the resale market. The rationale becomes, “Why would I pay X amount for something old when I can get a brand new home for less?” This is something to watch. It won’t affect every single neighborhood, but one of the hardest homes to sell right now is one that is just a couple of years old because it’s very challenging to compete with the incentives offered in brand-new construction.

BUYERS, KEEP YOUR ANTENNAS UP

Keep your antennas up with builder incentives and prices. There could be some better deals out there for you if economic uncertainty persists (and rates remain higher). And no pressure from me to buy. Do whatever you want.

EXAMPLE OF INCENTIVES FROM A LOCAL BUILDER

I spotted this on Instagram yesterday. If you have other examples, I’d love to see. Please email me anytime.

WHERE IS VOLUME GROWING AND SHRINKING?

Where is the market moving? I have ten counties of data today. I’m hopeful these images will be useful to tell the local real estate story and even consider where to focus business. The first image shows what is happening in various price ranges from last year to this year. The second visual helps us see the percentage each price segment represents. For instance, in Sacramento County, 1.4% of all sales sold above $1.5M in Q1.