Nicole Friedman

So existing home sales have risen for three straight months, which is the longest streak of gains since late 2024.

And so that shows a little bit of momentum here at the end of the year, driven by slightly lower mortgage rates.

So mortgage rates in recent months have been lower than they were earlier in the year, and that is bringing some buyers into the market.

It's a slightly more affordable time to buy a home.

And so there is some optimism that if rates continue to decline, that that could lead to an increase in home buying activity in 2026.

But overall, home sales are still really low.

This year is still likely to be

at or near the lowest level since the mid-90s for existing home sales.

So even with this slight uptick in momentum, it's from a really low base, and we're not seeing any huge increase in home buying activity just yet.

I think the general experience for home buyers is that it's stressful.

That's our colleague, Nicole Friedman.

She covers real estate.

It's very expensive to buy a home, especially these days.

Home prices are high.

Mortgage rates are high.

And in a lot of parts of the country, there are still not enough homes to choose from.

The inventory is lower than it was before the pandemic.

And so they're really kind of glued to the listing sites, you know, waiting for a new home to pop up, hoping that this could be the one.

I think for a lot of buyers, that's where they start the process.

If they're thinking about buying a home, even just casually like, oh, is this the year maybe we should buy?