Lakeland, Florida, gardens at dusk. This housing market has witnessed a substantial decrease in home … More sales, and an increase in inventory and the number of days a home for sale spends on the market before getting bought.
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Mortgage rates still much higher than they were four years. As of July, the effective 30-year mortgage rate is 6.72%. That’s down from a peak of 7.62% in October 2023. Four years ago, in July 2021, the effective rate was 2.87%. Thus, home affordability is still a problem for many of America’s housing markets. But a key development recently has been noticed, namely, a slowing down of homebuying activity. In many housing markets there’s been a consequent decline in prices. More importantly, if these trends continue, prices may come down further.
Based on a list of the largest American metro areas by population, 100 housing markets were analyzed in terms of the change in the change in the number of home sales and the change in the median number of days on market year over year, from June 2024 to June 2025, as well as year-over-year rate for each year going back to 2020. The median days on market measures how many days a home spends on the market before going under contract, meaning the seller accepted an offer from a buyer. And home sales are the number of home sales in each market. All housing data was sourced from Redfin.
Read on to find out which markets have experienced the biggest slowdown in their housing activity over the last year.
Housing Markets Where Homebuying Has Slowed Significantly
Looking at number of home sales change in percentage terms over the course of one year, the majority of markets that have experienced the largest one-year increase are primarily in the U.S. West and South regions. Leading the way is the Lakeland metro area in Florida, which saw its home sales decline by 17.8%: From 1,425 home sales in June 2024 to 1,172 in June 2025. Out of all the cities analyzed, Lakeland’s one-year decrease in home sales was the greatest.
Below are the top 10 metro areas that have experienced the greatest decline in home sales over the course of the last year:
Lakeland, FL metro area: -17.8%%
Miami, FL metro area: -16.1%
Poughkeepsie, NY metro area: -13.2%
Las Vegas, NV metro area: -9.8%
Fresno, CA metro area: -7.9%
Bakersfield, CA metro area: -7.8%
Detroit, MI metro area: -6.9%
San Antonio, TX metro area: -6.5%
Salt Lake City, UT metro area: -4.9%
North Port, FL metro area: -4.8%
The Lakeland housing market has another metric that points to a slowdown: days on market. Its median days on market jumped by 42.2%, from 45 days in June 2024 to 64 days in June 2025. Pending sales, too, are down, having declined by 16.3% over the last year.
Below is a table containing the top 15 markets where home sales have decreased the most year over year now. It also includes the year changes in days on market, inventory, and pending sales.
Trends Among Markets With Decreasing Home Sales
There are four Florida housing markets that made the top-15 list: Lakeland metro, Miami metro, North Port metro, and Deltona metro. Every single one experienced an increase in days on market over the last year. Lakeland’s pending sales fell by 16.3%, with Deltona coming next with a decline of 14.7%.
There are also three California markets: Fresno metro, Bakersfield metro, and San Jose metro. The Fresno housing market also witnessed a 55.6% increase in the number of days on market. Inventory too grew, by a substantial 44.4%. Meanwhile, Bakersfield saw its days on market rise by 25%. Home sales fell by 7.8%, while pending sales declined by 12.7%.
There is only one housing market in New York that made the list: the Poughkeepsie metro area. North of New York City, up the Hudson River, this metro area is sizeable with a population of more than 700,000. It had the third largest decline in home sales over the last year, at 13.-2%. Its pending sales decreased by 7.3%. The Poughkeepsie metro area saw its largest year-over-year growth in home sales between 2020 and 2021, when they increased by 55.3%. Since then, every year-over-year change was negative.