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.
Mortgage-purchase applications are down 6 percent month-over-month, and Redfin’s Homebuyer Demand Index is essentially flat.
Pending home sales fell, too, declining 2.8 percent year-over-year nationwide during the four weeks ending April 27, according to Redfin. That dip is mainly due to a holiday effect — Easter fell into this year’s four-week period, but not in the comparable time frame in 2024. Even without that effect, however, pending sales would likely be flat from a year ago, Redfin said. 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,” Seattle-based Redfin Premier agent Bliss Ong said. “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 percent year-over-year, and the total number of homes for sale is up 13.7 percent.