Maryland Market Report

Comparing Maryland Housing Market Trends

Units Sold

According to the Maryland Realtors Housing Statistics, there were 3,681 residential and commercial units sold in January 2023. This shows a decrease of 1,443 units sold compared to December 2022. Winter is a naturally slow season for real estate sales, so this isn’t a surprise. This is actually the perfect time for buyers who’re looking for less competition to begin searching for a home before things start to pick up again in spring.

This also shows a significant decrease of about 38%, 2,226 units, compared to the number of units sold in January 2022. Even though this is a drastic difference compared to last year, it’s very understandable with the ups and downs of nationwide inflation and mortgage rates. Also at the beginning of 2022, buyers were still experiencing the effects of the extreme seller’s market caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, the buyer panic we saw over the past couple of years has worn off due to the buyer pool being more stabilized.

Months of Inventory

According to Maryland Realtors Housing Statistics, there’s currently 1.1 month’s worth of available MD housing inventory. This is a 10% decrease in the amount of Maryland’s housing market inventory from December 2022. Once again, this isn’t a surprise being as though the real estate market naturally tends to slow down in the winter season. Sellers tend to stay in their homes and prepare to list in the spring.

This current data also shows a 20% increase from the 0.9 month’s worth of MD housing inventory in January 2022. Proving the housing market is slowly but surely continuing to stabilize from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the latest Monthly Housing Market Trends Report from realtor.com:

“There were 65.5% more homes for sale in January compared to the same time in 2022. This means that there were 248,000 more homes available to buy this past month compared to one year ago. While the number of homes for sale is increasing, it is still 43.2% lower than it was before the pandemic in 2017 to 2019. This means that there are still fewer homes available to buy on a typical day than there were a few years ago.”

The graph below shows how today’s national inventory of homes for sale compares to recent years:

Average Price

The average price of a Maryland home in January 2023 was $419,587 stated by the latest Maryland Realtors Housing Statistics. This shows a decrease of $13,431 compared to the December 2023 average price of $433,018. The data shows that sellers are beginning to list their homes at slightly lower prices. Within my experience, I am also seeing that sellers are also holding firm on their home’s list price and offering less wiggle room for negotiations.

2023 Mortgage Rate Predictions

In 2022, mortgage rates were the main topic of conversation when referring to the housing market. According to Keeping Current Matters, this year’s mortgage rates exceeded 6% for the first time in over a decade. In 2021 mortgage rates were closer to 3%. The recent hike in rates caused many buyers across the nation, who were excited to begin the home buying process, to back out due to the lack of affordable housing.

As we enter into the last month of the first quarter, experts are expecting mortgage rates to lower and stabilize again by the end of this year. The graph below, provided by Keeping Current Matters, shows mortgage rate projections for 2023. According to Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, the Mortgage Bankers Association, and the National Association of Realtors this data shows the mortgage rate average should be around 5.73% by the end of the fourth quarter. Living in an era of unpredictability, I’m interested to see what mortgage rates will actually look like at the end of this year.