Home sales are climbing fastest in several Southern and Midwestern cities where housing inventory has rebounded above pre-pandemic levels, according to new data from Zillow.
Austin, Texas, leads all major U.S. metros with a 20 percent annual jump in sales, as buyers benefited from a sharp increase in available homes and improving affordability.
The COVID Surge
The COVID-19 pandemic transformed the U.S. housing market by driving a surge in demand at a time when supply was already limited.
Record-low mortgage rates, remote work and shifting lifestyle preferences fueled intense competition for homes, particularly in southern and suburban markets, while construction delays and low inventory pushed prices sharply higher.
Although higher interest rates later cooled the market, the impact of the pandemic on housing still trickles through to 2026, with many areas still facing inventory shortages and affordability issues.
In many parts of the South and West, construction activity during the pandemic housing boom has helped restore supply today, easing pressure on buyers and supporting stronger sales activity, Zillow reports. However, several Northeastern markets continued to post annual declines in home sales as inventory shortages persisted.
Texas And The South Lead Sales
Austin, Texas, posted the strongest year-over-year increase in existing home sales among major metro areas, Zillow reports, with sales rising 20 percent. The city also recorded inventory levels 52 percent above pre-pandemic averages, the highest in the country. Homes in Austin are now typically selling after 17 days, roughly in line with housing market conditions before COVID-19 disruption.
The company said markets that added housing supply during the pandemic are now seeing stronger recoveries in sales activity after enduring a slowdown in recent years.
“After years of low supply, markets with restocked shelves are seeing relatively stronger sales growth,” Orphe Divounguy, senior economist on Zillow’s economic research team, said in the report published this week. “Now those same markets with a wealth of options for buyers are seeing recovering sales, as incomes are more in line with prices.”
Texas metros featured heavily among the strongest-performing housing markets.
San Antonio recorded an 11.7 percent rise in annual home sales, while Dallas saw sales increase 8.6 percent. Houston posted more modest growth at 3.3 percent, though still above the national increase of 2.3 percent.
Where homebuilding expanded rapidly during the pandemic-era housing push, Zillow said inventory has now recovered fully in 19 of the nation’s 50 largest metro areas, with most concentrated in Southern and Western states.
Nashville, Tennessee, posted an 8.8 percent increase in sales, while Raleigh rose 7.4 percent and Miami climbed 6.6 percent. Phoenix and Denver each also recorded solid gains.
Milwaukee emerged as one of the strongest performing metros outside the Sun Belt, posting a 14.4 percent increase in existing home sales year over year. Richmond, Virginia, and New Orleans, Louisiana, each saw sales rise 12.7 percent.
Chicago also outperformed in the north east with a 10.1 percent increase, while Louisville, Kentucky, recorded a 7.8 percent gain.
Northeast Markets Continue to Struggle
While several Southern and Midwestern metros posted strong gains, many Northeastern cities saw sales decline over the year.
New York recorded an 8.7 percent drop in existing home sales, one of the steepest declines among major metros. Pittsburgh fell 8.3 percent, Providence dropped 8 percent and Philadelphia declined 7.7 percent.
Hartford, Connecticut, posted an 8.6 percent decrease, while Seattle and Buffalo also recorded notable declines.
Several California markets continued to struggle as well. Los Angeles posted a 1.9 percent decrease in sales, while Riverside and San Jose also declined year over year.
Zillow said rising costs beyond housing remain a major obstacle for many buyers nationwide, even as mortgage payments ease in some cities.
“The rising costs of everything else are one limiting factor, straining budgets and pausing major purchases,” the company said.
Inventory And Affordability
Despite improving conditions in some cities, the broader U.S. housing market remains constrained compared to historical standards. Nationwide inventory in April was still 18.7 percent below pre-pandemic norms, even after active listings increased 3.7 percent from a year earlier, Zillow reports.
New listings also remained subdued. Zillow said new listings nationwide were down 16 percent compared with 2018 and 2019 averages, while overall sales totals were still running roughly 18 percent below those pre-pandemic levels.
The company said that although individual homes are selling at roughly the same pace as before the pandemic, the market overall remains limited by a lack of supply.
“The spring housing market is warming up fastest in places where buyers finally have options to choose from,” Zillow said.
At the listing level, the pace of sales has largely normalized. Zillow noted that the median age of inventory nationwide is just one day lower than pre-pandemic averages, while homes that go pending are doing so only one day faster than they did in 2018 and 2019.
The improvement in affordability has also been considerable in some Sun Belt cities. Zillow found the typical monthly mortgage payment in Austin was down 9.8 percent from a year earlier, one of the largest declines in the country. Dallas, Texas also saw mortgage payments fall 7.4 percent year over year, while Denver, Colorado recorded a 7 percent drop. Raleigh, North Carolina, and San Antonio, Texas, also posted year-over-year declines.
