The Austin metro carried 2.7 months of supply in September 2016, a market tilted to sellers. The share selling above asking was 19%. The median sale was $280,084, up 8.6% year over year.
Austin market statistics, September 2016
| Metric | September 2016 |
|---|---|
| Median sale price | $280,084 (+8.6% YoY) |
| Median price per sq ft | $138 (+6.6% YoY) |
| Homes sold | 2,443 (-1.9% YoY) |
| New listings | 2,621 |
| Active inventory | 6,658 (+8.4% YoY) |
| Months of supply | 2.7 |
| Median days on market | 28 |
| Sale-to-list ratio | 98.3% |
| Sold above asking | 18.7% |
| Listings with a price cut | 33.0% |
| 30-year fixed rate (avg) | 3.46% |
The Fall Slowdown and What It Does to Negotiating Room
September is when the Austin market exhales. Showings thin, days on market stretch, and sellers who priced for June start having a different conversation. Nothing is wrong with the market in September; it is just that the people who had to move already did.
What changed since August 2016
The median fell $9,616 from August 2016, a 3.3% move. Time on market lengthened by 5 days, to 28. Active inventory shrank by 45 listings, to 6,658. The share of homes selling over asking gave up 3.9 points, to 18.7%.
One month is noise. The reason to read it anyway is that direction shows up in inventory and days on market well before it shows up in price, so the months where those two disagree with the headline number are the interesting ones.
Where this month sits in the cycle
| September 2016 | August 2016 | September 2015 | Since Oct 2016 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Median sale price | $280,084 | $289,700 | — | — |
| Median days on market | 28 | 23 | — | — |
| Active inventory | 6,658 | 6,703 | — | — |
| Months of supply | 2.7 | 2.3 | — | — |
| Sold above asking | 19% | 23% | — | — |
| 30-year fixed rate | 3.46% | 3.44% | — | — |
The right-hand column is the range this series has covered since October 2016. No forecast in it, just where September 2016 falls against every month that came before it.
If you are buying in Austin right now
At 2.7 months of supply, sellers still have the edge on the best listings and buyers have real leverage on everything else. The spread between those two groups is where the negotiation lives.
The average home sold for 98.3% of asking, so roughly 1.7% under list was the normal outcome, not an insulting one.
The payment math. At $280,084 with 20% down at 3.46%, principal and interest runs about $1,001 a month. Add roughly $467 for property taxes and $187 for insurance and you are near $1,655 a month all in. Texas has no state income tax and this is where the state collects instead, budget the tax line from day one, not as an afterthought.
If you are selling: 28 median days on market means your first two weeks decide the outcome. Price to the last ninety days of closed comps, not to what your neighbor listed at and did not sell. Condition and photography are doing more work now than they were two years ago.
Neighborhood in focus
South Austin (78704). Travis Heights, Bouldin Creek, Zilker, Barton Hills. Known for barton Springs, Zilker, tight inventory. It fits buyers who want walkability to South Congress and the park.
The metro numbers above are an average of a very unequal city, South Austin does not move in lockstep with Kyle or Leander, and the gap between ZIPs widens in exactly the months the metro looks calm. There is a longer, more honest write-up at /neighborhoods/south-austin/, including what is wrong with it.
On in Austin, September 2016
| When | What | Why it matters to a listing |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 24–25 | Pecan Street Festival (Fall), Sixth Street Historic District | The autumn edition, same footprint as May. Sixth Street closed for the weekend, downtown slow, nothing beyond it. |
| Home Saturdays | Texas Longhorns home games, Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium | I-35 through central, campus parking and everything within a mile of the stadium stop working by late morning on a home Saturday. A wasted afternoon for an open house in 78705, 78751 or downtown. |
What is coming next
ACL takes the first two weekends of October and the Formula 1 weekend follows it. For anyone selling near Zilker or the airport corridor, that is three weekends when showing a house is harder than it sounds.
Common questions
Should I buy in Austin or in the suburbs?
The honest trade: Round Rock, Cedar Park, Leander, Pflugerville, Georgetown, Kyle and Buda will get you meaningfully more square footage and, in Round Rock ISD, Leander ISD and Lake Travis ISD, schools that rate as well or better than most Austin ISD zones. What you give up is proximity, and in Austin proximity is the scarce good. The drive from Leander to downtown at 8am is not the drive you tested on a Sunday. Check the MUD rate before you compare prices; a suburban house can carry a higher monthly cost than a more expensive central one.
I am moving to Austin from California. What actually surprises people?
Four things, in order of how much money they cost. Property taxes, which run roughly 1.8-2.5% and have no Proposition 13-style cap beyond the 10% homestead limit. Homeowners insurance, which is among the highest in the country because of hail. Summer utility bills in an underinsulated house. And foundations: much of the region sits on expansive clay that moves with drought and rain, so watering your foundation is a real practice here and a structural engineer's report is money well spent on any older slab home.
How much do I need to earn to buy a median-priced Austin home?
At $280,084 with 20% down at 3.46%, the all-in monthly payment is roughly $1,655 including estimated taxes and insurance. At a 30% housing-to-income ratio that implies household income around $66,000. Lenders will approve you well above that; whether you should go there is a different question. Property taxes are estimated at 2.0% of value, verify the actual rate for the specific address, because a MUD can push it past 3%.
When is the best time of year to buy a house in Austin?
October through January, consistently. Austin's listing calendar runs about six weeks ahead of the national one. The best selection appears in March and April, and so does the most competition. By late fall, spring listings are six months old, sellers have adjusted their expectations, and days on market runs 30 to 50 days longer than it did in April. You get less to choose from and far more leverage over what is left.
Part of a retrospective series on the Austin market, one post per month since 2016, compiled from the historical record. This edition covers September 2016; every figure is as reported for that month, and nothing in it looks past it.
Source: Redfin Data Center metro market tracker: single-family, Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos metro, not seasonally adjusted. Mortgage rates are the monthly average of the Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey 30-year fixed rate. Payment, tax and insurance figures are estimates for illustration and are not a quote. Median sale price is not a guarantee of value for any specific property.
Written by Mike Vilece, a licensed Texas real estate agent with Compass in Austin. If you want the version of this that applies to your street and your budget, ask me directly.