Is now a good time to buy? How to read your local housing market

National headlines about the housing market rarely tell you anything useful about your specific neighborhood. Real estate is local, sometimes block by block. Here's what to look at.

Months of supply

This is the single most useful number for understanding whether it's a buyer's or seller's market: how many months it would take to sell all current inventory at the current sales pace.

• Under 3 months of supply: seller's market, expect competition and less negotiating room
• 3-6 months: balanced market
• Over 6 months: buyer's market, more room to negotiate on price and terms

Days on market

Track how long homes in your target neighborhood and price range are sitting before going under contract. A shrinking number suggests rising demand; a growing number suggests the market is cooling or the price point is overbuilt.

List-price-to-sale-price ratio

This tells you how much negotiating room exists. If homes are consistently selling at or above asking, buyers have little leverage. If homes are selling meaningfully below list, there's real room to negotiate.

What mortgage rates mean for your payment, not the headlines

Rate headlines move markets emotionally, but what matters is your actual monthly payment at today's rate versus what you're currently paying in rent, or what you'd pay if you waited and prices (or rates) moved in the other direction.

The question that matters more than market timing

Nobody consistently times real estate markets perfectly, not economists, not agents. The better question is: does this make sense for the next 5-7 years of your life? Buying a home you can comfortably afford in a market that fits your needs is rarely a bad decision, regardless of what the national headlines say that week.

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Want the real numbers for your specific target neighborhoods? Get in touch and I'll pull current months-of-supply and days-on-market data for the areas you're considering.