On October 21, Homes.com published its September 2026 housing report, and the headline numbers pull in three directions at once. The U.S. median sale price rose to $386,000 USD, up 0.6% year over year. Completed sales fell 6% over the same period. And the pool of active listings grew 1.9%. Prices up, transactions down, supply growing. That combination tells you something important about who holds the cards right now, and it's not the same answer in every city.
Key points
- The U.S. median sale price hit $386,000 USD in September 2026, up 0.6% year over year, while sales volume dropped 6%.
- Active listings rose 1.9%, giving buyers more choice and more leverage in many markets.
- Local divergence was extreme: San Francisco prices jumped 14.7% while Dallas–Fort Worth, Atlanta, Charlotte, Raleigh, and San Antonio each fell more than 2%.
- Condos were the weakest segment: prices down 1.4% and sales down 10.1%, even as single-family medians rose 1.3%.
- For agents, fewer transactions make every inquiry, every review, and every past-client touch worth more.
The report, drawn from 933 tracked U.S. markets, found that 593 of them, or 64%, still recorded year-over-year price appreciation in September. So the national gain isn't a story about a handful of hot metros dragging up the average. The gain is broad. What's not broad is the transaction side. Sales fell 6% nationally, which means roughly one in sixteen deals that closed a year earlier didn't happen this September. Brad Case, chief residential economist at Homes.com, summarized the dynamic plainly: high financing costs are sidelining some buyers, but persistent undersupply in many markets is keeping prices from falling broadly. Buyers have more leverage than they had a year ago. That leverage is just distributed very unevenly.
The local detail is where this report gets useful. San Francisco posted a 14.7% year-over-year price increase, hitting a median of $1,689,500, while its inventory shrank 14%. That's textbook tight-supply pricing. Meanwhile, Raleigh, San Antonio, Charlotte, Atlanta, and Dallas–Fort Worth each saw prices decline more than 2%. Cleveland, Chicago, St. Louis, and Detroit all gained more than 5%. If you're an agent in any of those markets, the national median of $386,000 is nearly useless as a conversation piece with a seller. A seller in a supply-growth market who reads a national headline about rising prices may overprice by five figures. A buyer in a tight-inventory market who reads the same headline may wait for a softening that isn't coming. The agent who can explain the difference, with real local numbers, is the one who gets the listing or earns the buyer's trust.
The property-type breakdown matters as much as geography. Single-family homes carried the market: the median rose 1.3% to $395,000, with inventory up 2.5%. Townhomes were essentially flat, down 0.1% to $355,000. Condos were the weak spot on every line: the median fell 1.4% to $345,000, sales dropped 10.1%, and inventory actually contracted 1.9%. Condo buyers pulling back while supply shrinks is an unusual combination, and it likely reflects rising fees and insurance costs rather than a simple demand story. Agents working the condo, investor, or downsizer niches should be ready for clients who've seen a national headline and drawn the wrong conclusion about their specific building type.
A necessary caveat first: this is U.S. data, in U.S. dollars, governed by U.S. mortgage markets. Canadian conditions in September 2026 depend on the Bank of Canada's policy rate, B-20 stress-test rules, and provincial policy, and CREA's Canadian medians are measured in Canadian dollars. Don't quote these figures to a client as if they describe Toronto or Halifax. That said, the underlying dynamic is familiar on this side of the border too: affordability pressure makes buyers more selective, more willing to tour more homes, and more willing to contact several agents before committing. When transactions thin out, the math for every agent gets sharper. Each inbound inquiry is worth more. Each past client is worth more. Each review on your Google Business Profile shortens a selective buyer's decision about who to call. The agents who lose ground in this kind of market are usually the ones who reply the next morning, run a generic website, and haven't touched their database in two years.
If you accept that a more selective buyer with more choices is the operative condition, the operational response is concrete. Speed first: a buyer who contacts three agents on a Tuesday evening usually works with whichever one answers first. A follow-up system that responds in under 60 seconds, 24 hours a day, converts inquiries that would otherwise evaporate. Local substance second: neighbourhood-level content with genuine local detail, not city-name swaps, is what ranks in local search and what makes a seller believe you actually know their street. Presentation third: when sellers compete for fewer buyers, the listing that shows better makes the shortlist. Virtual staging (disclosed per MLS and CREA rules, with architecture untouched), enhanced photography, and descriptions written in your voice are competitive levers, not cosmetic ones. And underneath all of it, your past-client database is the most durable pipeline you own. Home anniversaries, street-level market notes, and consent-based nurture with a real opt-out are the plays that matter when new-lead flow softens. Any email program should respect CASL, and any calling program should respect CRTC rules. That's the floor, not the ceiling.
Homes.com is a CoStar Group brand, and the release doubles as a marketing artifact for its agent-membership model. CoStar has put $1.25 billion into marketing the portal and claims 36,000-plus member agents in two years. The release also cites self-reported membership results, such as agents earning an average of $36,400 more in commissions in their first year, based on a self-selected cohort of roughly 11,000 members. Treat those numbers as promotional rather than independently verified. The market data, by contrast, is consistent with the broader post-2022 pattern of sticky prices and depressed volumes, and it's the part worth acting on.
The September 2026 U.S. report describes a market where prices hold because supply is still thin in many places, while the buyers who remain are choosier and slower to commit. For Canadian agents, the read-across is directional rather than literal, but the operational lesson travels well: when the transaction pool shrinks, the agent who answers fastest, publishes genuinely local content, presents listings well, and stays in touch with past clients captures a disproportionate share of what's left. Those are systems you can build. If you want a second opinion on how yours stack up, the Realtix team can be reached at [email protected] or through realtix.ca/contact.