LEHIGH VALLEY, Pa.- What’s the hottest zip code for homebuyers (or at least, aspiring home buyers) in the Lehigh Valley?

Which municipality has seen home prices increase the most over the past year?

Where can the most robust inventory of homes-for-sale be found?

The Greater Lehigh Valley REALTORS (GLVR) group has answers to all of those questions and more, via its 2025 report on the local housing market.

The report highlights a few national trends before digging into the local stats for all of 2025, compared to 2024 and other previous years.

The report is compiled from data from the GLVR’s Multiple Listing Service (MLS), which is used by more than 3,000 realtors and appraisers.

Here are some of the highlights.

Nationwide snapshot

First-time homebuyers are getting older in the U.S.

According to GLVR (using information from the National Association of REALTORS), by mid-2025, first-time buyers accounted for just 21% of all home purchases, while the typical age of a first-time buyer reached a record high of 40 years old.

“Younger buyers faced steep hurdles as high rents, inflation, and student loan debt limited their ability to save for a down payment,” the report said.

Also, the median age of all homebuyers- not just those purchasing for the first time- reached 59, GLVR wrote.

A look at the Lehigh Valley

Listings in Lehigh and Northampton counties were down nearly 10% in 2025 compared to the previous year. According to GLVR, there were 605 active listings at the end of 2025.

And the homes that were on the market got more expensive. According to the report, the overall median sales price increased 3.7% to $350,000 for the year. Single family home prices were up 5% percent from 2024, and townhouse and condo home prices were up 5.4%.

Sellers received, on average, 100.8% of their list price. And single-family homes were on the market for just 22 days, on average.

Zip codes that are hot (and maybe not)

The report also breaks down the specific regions of the Lehigh Valley that saw the biggest growth and declines in 2025 in areas like new listings, sales price and inventory.

For example, the Northwestern Lehigh area saw the biggest jump in median sales price (+20.7%) from 2024, followed by Northern Lehigh (+13.9%), Northampton (+10.2%), Whitehall (+7.5%) and Easton (+6.8%).

Southern Lehigh had the biggest drop in median sales prices, falling 9% from 2024. That was followed by Pen Argyl (-4.7%) and Parkland (-2.2%). Allentown and Catasauqua stayed the same at 0% growth.

Nazareth had the biggest increase in closed sales from 2024, jumping 26.3%. Salisbury was on the other end of the spectrum, with closed sales dropping 14.8% last year.

Wilson in Northampton County saw its inventory pop more than 70% by the end of 2025, compared to 2024. Northampton (+32.1%) was a distant second on that list. Meantime, Catasauqua’s inventory was down 57.9%, followed by Salisbury (-50%) and Northern Lehigh (-35.7%).

2026 forecast

GLVR said, looking ahead to 2026, experts are forecasting an improvement in market activity: “Mortgage rates declined through the second half of 2025 and are expected to stay in the 6% range in the year ahead, supporting incremental gains in affordability. As inventory builds, sales volume is projected to increase. Economists anticipate modest increases in home prices, well below the rapid appreciation of recent years.”

But inventory problems won’t be fixed overnight. 2026 will most likely be a year of “stabilization and recovery, rather than dramatic change,” GLVR said.