Homes sales were down nationwide in July, tumbling to the lowest level in nearly two years on a seasonally adjusted basis.
Some 285,300 deals were finalized across the country in July, a 4.1% decline from the previous month, according to new data released Wednesday by the online real estate brokerage Redfin. It’s the smallest number of closed sales recorded since September 2024.
Pending home sales, a more current indicator of the housing market since transactions can take a month or more to close, also fell last month. The 2.5% drop puts pending sales at their lowest point since December.
Utah homes sales data for July isn’t available yet. But in Salt Lake County, home sales fell from approximately 1,089 in June to 1,033 in July after adjusting for typical monthly seasonality, a decrease of 5.2%, Salt Lake Board of Realtors spokesman Dave Anderton told the Deseret News.
Pending home sales also were down in Salt Lake County between June and July, Anderton said, falling 14.7% compared to a 5.5% drop over the same period in 2025, an indication “that the pool of pending transactions contracted more sharply this July than it did a year ago.”
When compared to what happened in Salt Lake County’s housing market in July 2025, the number of closed sales increased slightly last month, while pending sales activity was nearly unchanged, he said.
Among the nation’s 50 most populous metropolitan areas analyzed by Redfin, a list that does not include any place in Utah, the sharpest year-over-year drops in home sales were in San Antonio, Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas, as well as in Detroit and Seattle.
Only a few metropolitan areas saw a surge in sales last month compared to July 2025, including West Palm Beach and San Francisco, both places where wealthy buyers are driving the market. Sales also jumped in Milwaukee, where homes are much more affordable.
The reasons Redfin cited for the U.S. sales slump are the same that’s been slowing the housing market much of the year: home prices and mortgage rates are rising amid economic uncertainty accelerated by the war against Iran launched by the U.S. and Israel at the end of February.
The median home price in the United States was up 3.2% year over year, hitting $407,730 in July. That’s the biggest-ever price tag for July, but down slightly from the record high of $408,776, set just a month earlier.
“The housing market suffered from a midsummer slump in July as would-be buyers grappled with record-high home prices, increasing mortgage rates and growing financial insecurity,” Chen Zhao, Redfin’s head of economics research, said in a post.
“Many Americans simply can’t afford today’s housing costs, while others are holding off because they’re worried about the economy and/or their job security,” Zhao said, adding there’s a “silver lining” for buyers with the resources to make a purchase, more ability to negotiate with sellers.