Housing Market: Buyers With ‘Cold Feet’ Bailed at Record Pace in July

A widespread case of cold feet is hitting the housing market this summer.

Homebuyers bailed on home purchases at a historic pace in July, according to a new Redfin analysis of real estate listings data, which found that 58,000 pending home purchases fell through last month.

That number represents about 15.3% of all pending home purchases in the US, and is the highest proportion of home-purchase cancellations seen in the month of July in at least eight years, the real estate listings site said.

Home-purchase cancellations were the most common in San Antonio, Texas, where 22.7% of pending home contracts fell through last month, Redfin said this week. That was followed by Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where 21.3% of contracts fell through, and Jacksonville, Florida, where 19.9% of contracts fell through in July.

Buyers getting cold feet has become more common in recent years. That’s coincided with lower affordability in the market, Redfin said, pointing to higher mortgage rates and home prices that could be sparking hesitation among some buyers.

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The 30-year fixed mortgage rate held steady at around 6.58% the last week, according to Freddie Mac. That’s down from highs of 7% this year, but far above levels during the pandemic, when the 30-year fixed rate hovered around 3%.

US home prices, meanwhile, climbed to a fresh record in June, with the median existing US home price rising to $435,300, according to data from the National Association of Realtors.

After a long stretch of brutal conditions, the housing market looks like it’s slowly leaning more in favor of buyers, with the amount of available inventory rising and price growth slowing. That’s another factor that could be contributing to home purchase cancellations, Redfin said in a note.

In a separate analysis in May, the firm estimated that the housing market had around half a million more sellers than buyers, the highest buyer-seller mismatch since at least 2013.