Awakening

After the second week in January, the Denver metropolitan real estate market started to awaken from the November-December holiday lull. The holiday lull and the mid-January awakening are typical, based on historic trends.

Denver Metro Home Supply, Inventory

Although the market remains tight — an incredibly low supply of available homes — active inventory rose in January (2,210 vs. 1,145 in December).* Most likely the numbers won't rise much, or might decrease, during the first half of February.

I believe Months Supply of Inventory is a true yardstick of the real estate market. A "balanced" market has at least three months and up to six months of supply available. In other words, if, starting today, no sellers were to list their home for sale, then — according to the definition of a balanced market — all the for-sale homes would sell in three to six months.

However, that figure was only 1.3 months in January, down from 1.5 months in December. Translation: The Denver metropolitan real estate market has an historically low amount of homes for sale.

Denver Metro Home Prices, Days on Market

The median price of sold homes — $620,000 — increased from the previous month ($603,000) and year ($590,000).

Days on market before receiving an offer experienced a typical seasonal increase, rising 8.9% from December. However, that means many of those homes that went on the market in November, and sat through the holidays, went under contract in January!

Presidents’ Day Weekend

The weekend after Presidents’ Day weekend (Feb. 17–19) usually is the unofficial kickoff to when the market picks up a lot of steam, which continues through June. July and August, although not as hot as March through June, also see heavy activity.

Buyer Demand

Buyer demand also ticked upward in January, reflected in a significant increase in pending transactions (not shown).

Multiple Offers, Price Reductions

Although multiple offers still are occurring but much less so compared to the peak pandemic years, many for-sale homes reduced their price, often by as much as 5%–10% of the original asking price. 

*Days on market can be skewed by how new construction homes are processed in the MLS.