- Utah's median home prices remain high despite dropping mortgage rates.
- Housing analyst Dejan Eskic attributes the stable prices to a lack of forced selling situations.
- Decreasing mortgage rates still offer refinancing opportunities and optimism for prospective buyers.
SALT LAKE CITY — Utah homebuyers are grappling with prices that refuse to fall.
According to the latest data from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah, the median sales price for all housing types in Utah — which includes single-family homes, townhomes and condos — is $520,000.
Yet, the state's housing market has slowed down amid higher mortgage rates, and there are more sellers than buyers.
If that's the case, why haven't prices dropped?
'Kind of annoying'
Home prices in Utah have climbed little by little basically every month this summer, according to data from the Gardner Institute, and buyers are noticing.
"(It's been) kind of annoying," said Chad Beebe, who lives in Orem and has been looking for a house on and off for a few months. "It seems like all the homes are a little overvalued, and people are not really eager to sell. It seems like they don't really need to, maybe more they want to."
That's exactly what Dejan Eskic, a housing analyst at the Gardner Institute, said is happening.
"There's no forced selling like we saw back during the great financial crisis where foreclosures were rising and people were losing their jobs and so they couldn't make their mortgage payments," Eskic said. "We're not seeing that right now."
As KSL-TV has previously reported, home prices in Utah skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic and hit a peak in mid-2022. Since then, they've only climbed a little, but they're not falling — despite changes in the housing market like higher mortgage rates.
"For the most part in Utah, the economy is still pretty strong. We're still getting in-migration. People are still moving here. So that demand is relatively still there," Eskic said. "And the sellers aren't desperate to sell, so they're not willing to take an offer that is not up to their standard."
Climbing prices
Home prices have climbed or stayed flat for several months. According to the Gardner Institute data, the statewide median housing price sat at $520,000 during both July and August. Before that, the median price was $515,000 in June, and $513,000 in May.
For each of those months, according to the data, home prices were higher than they were the year before.
Eskic noted housing prices have fallen only a few times over the last several decades.
"For the most part, the housing market stays pretty stable," he said, "so unless something horrible happens in the economy and we have a lot of job losses, prices usually don't fall down."
Is there any good news?
The silver lining right now with the housing market is that mortgage rates continue to drop, although not yet by a significant amount. The daily rate was listed at 6.29% on Tuesday, according to Mortgage News Daily, while the latest weekly average was 6.5%, per Freddie Mac.
"Mortgage rates continue to trend down, increasing optimism for new buyers and current owners alike," said Freddie Mac. "As rates continue to drop, the number of homeowners who have the opportunity to refinance is expanding. In fact, the share of market mortgage applications that were for a refinance reached nearly 47%, the highest since October."
There are also a lot of homes for buyers to choose from. Eskic said Utah currently has upward of 12,000 or 13,000 homes listed for sale.
Still, navigating those high prices is a challenge for buyers like Beebe, who hovers between optimism and pessimism about the housing market.
"We're not super eager to buy at a bad deal," said Beebe, who's patient as he scans housing listings. "We got time."
