{"id":466924,"date":"2026-10-15T16:26:07","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T16:26:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/466924\/"},"modified":"2026-10-15T16:26:07","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T16:26:07","slug":"har-housing-market-activity-cools-in-houston-amid-higher-mortgage-rates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/466924\/","title":{"rendered":"HAR: Housing market activity cools in Houston amid higher mortgage rates"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Home sales decreased in Houston during September as mortgage rates surpassed 7%, according to the latest Housing Market Update from the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.har.com\/content\/department\/newsroom?pid=2247\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Houston Association of REALTORS\u00ae<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Closings declined 5.7% year over year, with 7,030 home sales during the month. Meanwhile, the <a href=\"https:\/\/houstonagentmagazine.com\/2026\/10\/07\/mortgage-rates-3-year-high\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">average 30-year mortgage rate<\/a> reached 7.03% during the last week of September and continued to increase to 7.28% and 7.4% in the first two weeks of October, Freddie Mac reported.<\/p>\n<p>Pending listings decreased by 11.6% year over year, with 6,789 properties going under contract, indicating slow sales in the coming weeks and months as well.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHigher mortgage rates are making buyers look more closely at what they can comfortably afford,\u201d said HAR Chair Theresa Hill. \u201cPeople are taking a little more time, weighing their options and focusing on long-term affordability. Stable prices and a broad selection of homes are helping keep opportunities within reach.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As sales decreased, active listings rose 6.3% year over year, with 40,192 homes on the market. Given the rate of sales, Houston had a 5.5-month inventory, up 0.4 months year over year.<\/p>\n<p>The average home price increased 0.7% to $421,311, while the median was steady at $325,000.<\/p>\n<p>Existing-home sales<\/p>\n<p>Looking at only <a href=\"https:\/\/houstonagentmagazine.com\/2026\/10\/13\/nar-existing-home-sales-4\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">existing-home sales<\/a> (excluding new construction), sales were steady year over year with 5,062 closings during the month. The average price fell 1.1% to $427,110, while the median was steady at $325,000.<\/p>\n<p>Condo and townhome sales<\/p>\n<p>For-sale townhomes and condominiums saw a 21% annual decrease in closings, with just 323 properties sold in September. Pending sales fell 15.9%.<\/p>\n<p>The average sales price dipped 4.6% year over year to $261,052, while the median dropped 9.1% to $209,000.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, active listings increased 6.9% to 3,609, giving the townhome\/condo market a 9.3-month inventory, up from eight months a year prior.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Home sales decreased in Houston during September as mortgage rates surpassed 7%, according to the latest Housing Market&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466925,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[27690,56,24716,58,64829,57,50989,27475,51001,56090],"class_list":["post-466924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-har","tag-houston","tag-houston-association-of-realtors","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-home-sales","tag-houston-news","tag-houston-real-estate","tag-mortgage-rates","tag-sc","tag-theresa-hill"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466924"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466924\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466925"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}