To get a sense for what the mood is among real estate agents right now, look no further than Portland, Oregon. Like the vast majority of the country, the city’s housing market has been stymied by high mortgage rates, low inventory and mismatched expectations between buyers and sellers.
But now that the new rules related to the National Association of Realtors‘ (NAR) settlement have taken effect, there’s added confusion, anxiety and uncertainty, leaving agents to wrestle with tensions at every turn.
“’Combative’ is a really good word to use,” said Redfin agent Meme Loggins, who according to RealTrends Verified data ranked No. 25 statewide in 2023 transaction volume. “Everybody feels like they need to fight a fight. Buyers think it’s a buyer’s market. Sellers think it’s a seller’s market. It’s just very emotional right now.”
The Portland metropolitan area — which also includes parts of southwest Washington — was one of the markets that boomed the biggest after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. From March 2020 to July 2022, the median home price rose 23% before hitting a brief lull. But a year later, it was up by 32% compared to March 2020, according to data from Altos Research.
After rising at an unsustainable pace, prices haven’t moved much in the past year, making it one of the post-pandemic boomtowns like Austin and Tampa that have largely stalled. On top of that, Portland is dealing with the same conditions as other locations — high interest rates, low affordability and relatively low inventory.
“We are in a lukewarm market,” said Javier Alomia of the Alomia Group. “Overall activity has been stagnant. We’re not getting multiple offers. They are still selling within a week or two at very close to price, but it’s not a frenzy.”
Data from Altos Research indicates that the Portland market is shifting toward buyers, many of whom are waiting for mortgage rates to come down or for the November election to pass.
The Altos Market Action Index, which measures the balance between buyers and sellers, has dropped from 47 to 40 since May. Altos considers a score above 30 to be indicative of a seller’s market. For context, the index maxed out at 100 in April 2022, when demand was dramatically outpacing supply.
On a 90-day rolling basis, new listings have dropped from 630 in early July to 530 in mid-September as sellers have decided to hold off on marketing their homes. There’s also a growing pileup of for-sale inventory, which has hit a post-pandemic high of 5,100.
The ratio between price increases and price decreases also points to things shifting toward buyers. The share of listings with a price increase has dropped 2 percentage points from the spring to 3.7%, while the share of listings with price cuts has risen above 40% after falling to 27% in the spring.
Eventually, the new rules related to the NAR settlement will stop being a source of anxiety for buyers and sellers, which will leave mortgage rates as the biggest variable in the Portland housing market.
As of Tuesday, the rate for a 30-year conforming mortgage was 6.35%, according to HousingWire‘s Mortgage Rates Center, the lowest figure since February 2023. With the Federal Reserve expected to cut its benchmark rate on Wednesday, there’s optimism that buyers and sellers who’ve been waiting for mortgage rates to come down will reenter the market.
But Keller Williams agent Aubrey Martin, who according to RealTrends Verified ranks No. 18 in sides in Oregon, said that the rate cut is a given and has already been baked into the market.
“The lending market has already responded to the quarter percent that [the Fed is] talking about,” she said. “I do think rates will come down over time, but unless they drop it half a point, it’s going to be slow. It is not going to be this dramatic drop.”
Martin said she’s seeing interest in the Portland suburbs picking up as people who left the city for more rural areas start to come back. She believes this is the result of employers rolling back work-from-home policies.
“It’s not convenient at all to live out in the sticks,” she said. “They were used to living in the suburbs or the city, and I think that a lot of people found they didn’t actually like it.”
