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Why Are Home Inventory and Prices
Both Increasing?
By Rick Tobin
AllTime Record High Listing Values
California just reached an alltime record median home price peak of $ 910,160 in April 2025, as per the California Association of Realtors. This new record state price number was more than $ 500,000 above the national median home price in the same month.
How much longer will home prices keep rising and home listing inventory numbers remain below historical norms, both here in California and across the nation?
In April 2025, the estimated days on market( DOM) statewide for California was listed as being as low as 31 median days on market by Redfin. The very low days on market listing number is a key factor why California home prices just surpassed alltime record highs.
By comparison, the median number of days a home spent on market in May 2025 as a listing in the U. S. reached 51 days, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The median list price for U. S. home listings was $ 431,250 for May.
During the depths of the previous housing meltdown in California back in 2010, the median days on market was
listed as 57.5 days as per the California Association of Realtors. However, the average days on market statewide for 2010 listings was listed by other sources as much longer at nearly 140 days, partly since it took several years for some listings to sell.
California ' s active home listing supply is lower today than back in 2019. Ten states are now back above prepandemic 2019 active housing inventory levels:
• Arizona
• Colorado
• Florida
• Idaho
• Hawaii
• Oregon
• Tennessee
• Texas
• Utah
• Washington Source: ResiClubResiClub
The main exception to the low days on market rule for California home listing inventory is found in some higher price luxury home regions. For example: " San Diego County homes costing $ 6 million and up are taking an average 633 days to sell,” as per the San Diego Union Tribune.
The U. S. housing market now has 500,000 more home sellers than homebuyers. What about the huge supply of distressed homes that have been in forbearance as far back as 2020? When will a larger percentage of this " shadow inventory " be added to the national home listing inventory?
After adding up another few trillion in commercial real estate listings, the combined listing values for all real estate property types do really reach alltime record highs.
There are now almost $ 700 billion dollars’ worth of home listings for sale in the United States, which is a new record since Redfin began tracking this data in 2012. This same study found that the total combined value of homes for sale is up + 20.3 % from last year.
The total number of growing listing inventory for homes for sale nationwide also had a yearoveryear increase of + 16.7 % in April 2025, as per Redfin and NBC. However, homesale prices still rose + 1.4 % over the period of 12 months by April 2025.
Please note that since home values in most metropolitan regions across the nation are likely to be at or near alltime record highs, this alltime combined record home listing number is not necessarily all negative. It just partly means that home values are much higher in 2025 than in years past.
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