Warren Buffett is worried about the housing market (Video)

There are already plenty of markets nationwide where the inventory of unsold homes has built up over the past few years and home prices have ticked down. But nationally, home prices are still higher year over year, and some places like New York state had significant home-price gains in 2024 due to persistently tight inventory.

Today, the weekly Altos Research-tracked active market data shows signals for this spring that more markets are softening and fewer are pushing higher. Therefore, average price growth across the country may turn negative compared to a year prior. 

There are many ways to measure home prices and even more signals about future sale prices. I think it’s important to note that almost all these metrics have been showing flatter home-price appreciation. After a little burst of strength a few months ago, many of the home-price metrics have gradually flattened from a year prior. Now some of them are sliding below the year prior, which is driven by relentlessly high mortgage rates. 

Let’s take a look at the data for the third week of January 2025.