Mortgage-purchase applications are declining and pending home sales are sluggish

SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 1, 2025-- (NASDAQ: RDFN) — The 2025 spring homebuying season is lackluster, with record-high housing costs and widespread economic instability keeping would-be homebuyers at bay, according to a new report from Redfin (redfin.com), the technology-powered real estate brokerage.

Mortgage-purchase applications are down 6% month over month, and Redfin’s Homebuyer Demand Index—a measure of tours and other buying services from Redfin agents—is essentially flat.

Pending home sales fell, too, declining 2.8% year over year nationwide during the four weeks ending April 27. That dip is mainly due to a holiday effect—Easter fell into this year’s four-week period, but not in the comparable period in 2024—but even without that effect, pending sales would likely be flat from a year ago. Sales were sluggish last spring, and they’re sluggish again this spring.

There are two key reasons a lot of prospective house hunters are staying on the sidelines:

• Record-high housing costs. The median U.S. monthly housing payment is at an all-time high of $2,870, due to still-rising home prices and elevated mortgage rates.
• Economic uncertainty. Many Americans are holding off on major purchases because they’re uncertain about the future of the economy due to things like tariffs and the increasing odds of a recession.

“A lot of people who would normally be making moves right now are standing still,” said Bliss Ong, a Redfin Premier agent in Seattle. “They want to ride out this period of economic uncertainty and wait until they feel more secure to make this huge financial decision. The people who are buying are picky; for instance, buyers aren’t making offers if a home is on a busy street, or if it has one bathroom instead of two bathrooms. When the market was hotter, those homes would fly off the shelves despite not checking every single box.”

Redfin agents in many parts of the country say they’re seeing more action from sellers than buyers. New listings are up 6.1% year over year, and the total number of homes for sale is up 13.7%.

For Redfin economists’ takes on the housing market, please visit Redfin’s “From Our Economists” page.

Leading indicators

Key housing-market data

To view the full report, including charts, please visit:
https://www.redfin.com/news/housing-market-update-record-high-housing-costs-economic-uncertainty

About Redfin

Redfin (www.redfin.com) is a technology-powered real estate company. We help people find a place to live with brokerage, rentals, lending, and title insurance services. We run the country's #1 real estate brokerage site. Our customers can save thousands in fees while working with a top agent. Our home-buying customers see homes first with on-demand tours, and our lending and title services help them close quickly. Our rentals business empowers millions nationwide to find apartments and houses for rent. Since launching in 2006, we've saved customers more than $1.8 billion in commissions. We serve approximately 100 markets across the U.S. and Canada and employ over 4,000 people.

Redfin’s subsidiaries and affiliated brands include: Bay Equity Home Loans®, Rent.™, Apartment Guide®, Title Forward® and WalkScore®.

For more information or to contact a local Redfin real estate agent, visit www.redfin.com. To learn about housing market trends and download data, visit the Redfin Data Center. To be added to Redfin's press release distribution list, email press@redfin.com. To view Redfin's press center, click here.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250501764938/en/

Contact Redfin
Redfin Journalist Services:
Tana Kelley
press@redfin.com

Source: Redfin