Housing market shifts in buyers' favor as more sellers offer concessions

Good news, homebuyers: buying a house looks like it's getting just a little bit easier. Mortgage rates are still high and home prices are still hovering near records, but more sellers are looking to sweeten the deal for buyers by slashing prices or throwing in concessions, such as paying for repairs, extra amenities, or offering to buy down a buyer's mortgage rate to close the deal.
The percentage of sellers who offered a concession to buyers rose to around 45% in August, up from 43% the prior year. It marks the highest proportion of sellers offering concessions in August in at least the last six years, according to Redfin data.

The percentage of sellers who offered a concession and a price cut rose to nearly 16%, the real estate listings site said on Friday. Around 20% of active listings have had a price drop, up 0.6 percentage points from the prior year, Redfin data shows.
The trend has largely been driven by an imbalance of sellers and buyers in the housing market, with many prospective buyers sitting on the sidelines due to high mortgage rates and elevated home prices. The average 30-year fixed mortgage rate ticked up to 6.95% in the last week, according to Freddie Mac data, and other national surveys show the rate well above 7%.

Across the US, home sellers outnumbered buyers by 58%, Redfin said in a previous report. America's supply of homes for sale also rose to a 10-year high in August, according to the National Association of Realtors. Concessions have been particularly common in the Sun Belt, a region in the US where sellers heavily outnumber buyers.
The deluge of inventory is giving buyers more options and the ability to be picky when shopping for a home. Last month, concessions appeared most frequently in Atlanta, where they were included in 73% of deals. It was followed by Charlotte and Phoenix, where around 67% of sales involved concessions.

The housing market has been stuck in a yearslong deep freeze as high rates continue to keep buyers on the sidelines. Most forecasters are expecting mortgage rates to remain above the 6% threshold in the near future. 2026, meanwhile, looks on track to be the weakest year for home sales since 2011, according to an estimate from Capital Economics.