Portland Metro Housing Market Update: Week of October 6, 2026
Rates Hit 7.375% & the Typical Home Is Now Taking Six Weeks to Sell
By Lauren Perreault, REALTOR®, Managing Principal Broker, Fiv Realty Co OR & WA
October arrived in the Portland Metro market with a clear message: the fall slowdown is here, and this year it has company. OnPoint Community Credit Union’s 30-year fixed rate climbed to 7.375% this week, the highest reading since we began tracking it in February. New contracts fell to their lowest level since mid-January. And for the first time in this cycle, it isn’t just the slow, overpriced listings stretching out the numbers. The typical home is taking longer to sell, too.
This was a clean reporting week (September 28 through October 4, with no holidays in the window), so what you see below is the market itself, not calendar noise. Here’s the full breakdown for Clark County WA and Multnomah, Washington and Clackamas Counties OR.
Supply
Active listings came in at 8,510 this week, down 1.6% from 8,646 the week before. That’s the second straight weekly decline from 8,661 on September 22, which is the highest active-listing count in our records going back to April 2021. Two weeks doesn’t make a trend, but it does look like inventory may be cresting right at the top of its range.
Even after slipping, inventory is still up 6.9% from the same week last year (7,964). The 12-week rolling average, which smooths out the week-to-week bounce, sits at 8,486 compared with 8,354 a year ago, a 1.6% increase.
New listings slowed to 525, down 4.4% from 549 the prior week and 5.7% below the 557 that came on during the same week last year. The 12-week average of 620 is essentially even with last year’s 616, so the flow of fresh inventory hasn’t dried up. It’s just doing what it does every October: tapering as sellers who planned a fall listing have mostly already listed.
Put supply and sales together and we get about 3.9 months of inventory, based on active listings divided by the 12-week average pace of closings. That compares with roughly 3.6 months at this time last year, so the market is more balanced than Portland sellers have been used to.
Demand
This is where the week’s story gets important.
New pending sales, the count of homes that went under contract during the week, fell to 480. That’s down 9.6% from 531 the week before, down 19.2% from 594 a year ago, and the fewest new contracts in a single week since mid-January. The 12-week average of 579 runs 9.2% below last year’s 638, so this isn’t one soft week. Contract activity has been running below last year’s pace for months, and it’s now drifting lower.
Total pending sales, the full pipeline of homes under contract but not yet closed, dropped 7.4% to 2,524. That’s the fourth straight weekly decline, the lowest total since late January, and 17.9% below the same week last year (3,076).
Homes sold, on the other hand, jumped to 558 from 447, a 24.8% week-over-week gain and the most closings since early August. Don’t read that as a demand rebound. Closings reflect contracts written 30 to 45 days ago, and this week’s window included September 30, the end of the month, when closings tend to bunch up as buyers and sellers aim for a month-end date. Even with the bounce, closings were 9.0% below the 613 recorded in the same week last year, and the 12-week average of 504 is about 1.9% behind last year’s 514.
One more way to read demand: new pending sales equaled 91% of new listings this week. When fewer homes go under contract than come on the market, inventory builds over time. That ratio is worth watching through the rest of October.
Pricing
The average sale price came in at $620,119, down 0.5% from last week and the lowest weekly average since late April. Compared with the same week last year ($630,312), it’s down 1.6%. The median sale price, the true middle of the market, dipped 1.5% to $548,900, which is 1.1% below last year’s $554,900.
Before anyone reads a headline about “falling prices,” look at the 12-week rolling averages, which filter out the noise of which homes happened to close in a given week:
- 12-week average sale price: $632,215, compared with $630,613 a year ago (+0.3%)
- 12-week median sale price: $555,699, compared with $560,745 a year ago (-0.9%)
Both averages have eased off their summer highs, which is a normal seasonal fade, and both sit within about 1% of last year. Prices in the Portland Metro are flat, not falling. What has changed is how much work it takes to get a home sold at those prices, which you’ll see in the next two sections.
Price Reductions
Sellers cut prices on 1,011 listings over the past seven days, up 9.4% from 924 the week before and 8.8% higher than the same week last year (929). The 12-week average of 949 runs 2.8% above last year’s pace. Roughly 11.9% of all active listings took a price cut this week alone.
The size of those cuts matters even more. Of this week’s reductions, 551 were for $15,000 or more, about 55% of the total. Sellers who missed the mark are making real corrections, not token trims. That’s the second-highest count since we started tracking $15K+ reductions in January, just one shy of the 552 recorded on September 15.
Days on Market: The Two-Speed Market Is Shifting Gears
Average days on market rose to 72 this week, up from 68, while median days on market climbed to 41 from 36. Both are the slowest readings since late winter: the average is the highest since early March, and the median is the highest since mid-February. Compared with the same week last year, average DOM is up from 56 and median DOM is up from 33.
The 31-day gap between average and median is the “two-speed market” we’ve been tracking all year. Most homes sell at a reasonable pace; a subset of listings sits much longer and drags the average up. Our cross-check of RMLS area data (comparing average sale price with market time across about 15 Portland Metro sub-areas) found essentially no relationship between how expensive an area is and how long homes take to sell there (r≈0.08). The priciest submarket, Lake Oswego/West Linn, actually moved faster than several much cheaper areas. That doesn’t prove the gap has nothing to do with price or location, but it’s real evidence that “expensive homes just take longer” isn’t the main driver. Pricing relative to local market value is the more likely explanation.
Here’s what’s new this week, and it’s the most important number in this report: the median has climbed from 27 days to 41 days in just six weeks. The median is the typical home. When it moves that much, the slowdown is no longer just about stale, overpriced listings. Even well-positioned homes are taking longer now.
The 12-week rolling averages show how recent this shift is. The 12-week average DOM is 60.3 days, about 12% higher than last year’s 53.8. But the 12-week median is 29.4 days, still about 4% faster than last year’s 30.5. In other words, the typical home was still selling at last year’s pace for most of the summer. The change is happening right now, which is exactly why sellers listing this fall need to plan for it.
Sale-to-List Ratio
The average home sold for 99.16% of its final asking price, up slightly from 98.99%. The median sale-to-list ratio dipped to 99.78% from 101.27%, so the typical sale closed just a fraction under full asking price this week. The 12-week averages sit at 99.12% (average) and 100.30% (median).
The number I’d focus on is the sale price compared with the original list price: 95.37%, essentially flat from 95.44% last week but down from 98.67% back in mid-April. On a $600,000 original list price, that’s the difference between closing around $592,000 at April’s ratio and around $572,000 at today’s. That widening gap is the cost of starting too high and chasing the market down with reductions. Homes priced right from day one still sell close to full asking. Homes that start high give up real money on the way down. (Sale-to-list tracking began in January 2026, so year-over-year comparisons aren’t available yet.)
Rates
OnPoint’s 30-year fixed rate rose another eighth of a point to 7.375% this week, with 0.250 points and an APR of 7.465%. That’s the highest rate since we began tracking OnPoint’s rate card in February 2026, when it sat at 5.625%. Points actually fell from 0.500 last week, which is why the APR rose a bit less than the rate.
The more telling number is the pace. Just six weeks ago, on August 25, the rate was 6.500%. That’s seven-eighths of a point in six weeks. The 12-week rolling average is 6.719%, and today’s rate is running well above it.
What does that mean in real life? Using OnPoint’s own example of a $412,500 loan, the principal-and-interest payment at 7.375% is about $2,849 a month. At 6.500% in late August, the same loan was about $2,607. That’s roughly $242 more every month, or about $2,900 a year, for the same house. New contracts slowing as rates climbed is no coincidence.
Other Indicators
- Bumpable listings (under contract but still accepting backup offers): 86 this week, with 12 in Washington, down from 97 last week.
- Bank-owned & short sales (REO/SS): 115 active and 114 pending, still a very small slice of a market with more than 8,500 active listings.
- Cancelled & expired listings: 164 cancelled and 214 expired. Expirations typically spike at month-end when listing agreements run out, and this week’s window included September 30.
My Read
Three things are true at once right now, and each one points to the same strategy.
First, prices are holding. On a 12-week basis, the average and median sale prices are within about 1% of last year. Nothing in this data suggests a price slide.
Second, buyers have more leverage than they’ve had in a long time. Inventory is near the top of its five-year range, months of supply is up, more than 1,000 sellers cut their price this week, and rates at 7.375% are thinning the buyer pool. New contracts are at their lowest since January.
Third, the slowdown has reached the typical home. With the median DOM at 41 days, even good listings need a plan for a longer runway.
If you’re selling this fall, the margin for error has shrunk. Price to the market you’re in, not the one from June. Present the home well from day one. Be ready to respond to the first two weeks of feedback rather than waiting a month. The sellers who come out ahead in this market are the ones who start accurate, not the ones who start high and adjust.
If you’re buying, this is a window with genuine negotiating room, especially on homes that have been sitting 60 days or longer. Look closely at rate buydowns, seller concessions and inspection credits; those can be worth more to you than a small price cut when rates are this high. If rates ease later, refinancing is an option. A missed opportunity on the right house usually isn’t.
Let’s Talk
Call or text me if you want to truly understand what is happening in the Portland Metro real estate market and how various factors influence pricing. 503-683-1885 | PDXHomesforSale.com
Want to see what’s on the market right now? Search live listings at search.pdxhomesforsale.com, and check back next week for the next update in this series.
Exceptional Strategy, Extraordinary Results.
Warmly,
Lauren
Lauren Perreault
REALTOR®, Managing Principal Broker
Fiv Realty Co OR & WA | Licensed in OR, WA & CA
503-683-1885 | lauren@PDXHomesforSale.com
PDXHomesforSale.com | search.pdxhomesforsale.com