Anyone who’s poked around Zillow the last few weeks probably noticed something: more listings are sitting a little longer, and there’s more to choose from than there was in the spring.
That’s not a red flag. It’s September.
Every year, the Michigan market shifts as summer winds down. Buyers who were racing each other in June start taking their time. Sellers who wanted top dollar in May start pricing more realistically. It’s the most normal thing in the world, and this year it’s showing up clearly in the numbers.
Across the broader Southeast Michigan market (Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti, Belleville, Van Buren Township, and the communities around them), pending sales in August were down about 10 percent compared to last August, and closed sales dipped around 5 percent. Inventory, on the other hand, climbed more than 15 percent. There’s simply more on the market right now than there was a year ago, and fewer people racing to grab it.
That shift shows up in the months-of-supply number too, which moved from 2.8 to 3.2. It’s still a market that favors sellers overall, but it’s not the frantic, multiple-offer environment we saw earlier this year. Buyers have a little more room to breathe.
Here’s the part that surprises people: prices are still going up. The median sale price in August was $305,000, up about 5 percent from last year. Year to date, it’s up 4 percent. Houses are still selling close to asking too, at just under 99 percent of list price on average.
So we’ve got more inventory, a slower pace, and prices that keep climbing anyway. That combination is exactly what a healthy, seasonal market looks like. It’s not cooling off because something is wrong. It’s cooling off because that’s what happens every fall.
Condos are telling a slightly different story. Closed sales there dropped closer to 11 percent in August, and days on market crept up to 42, a couple days longer than last year. Months of supply jumped nearly 27 percent. If you’re buying or selling a condo specifically, that’s worth keeping in mind, because it’s moving at its own pace right now, separate from the single-family market.
For buyers, this is genuinely one of the better windows we’ve seen in a while. More inventory means more options and less pressure to waive everything just to compete. You can actually take a weekend to think about a house instead of making a decision in six hours.
For sellers, the numbers say your house still has real value, but the strategy has to change with the season. Pricing it right the first time matters more now than it did in May, because buyers have options and they’re comparing.
Strategy always matters more than guessing, especially when the market shifts underneath you like this. If you want to talk through what these numbers mean for your specific situation, I’m always glad to walk through it with you.
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