Sellers keep the upper hand in the expensive, wealthy Northeast

yahoo! Finance ^ | 08/09/2025 | Claire Boston

[millenial4freedom]

Homebuyers are gaining power in much of the country. Just not in the wealthy, pricey East Coast.

Consensus is growing among economists that home prices will flatline or even fall on a national level in 2025 as the housing market spends a third year stuck in a deep slump. But those national trends mask a housing market that looks increasingly fractured, with prices rising in many cities in the Northeast and Midwest, and falling in parts of the Southeast and Mountain West.

In the stretch of cities between Richmond, Va., and Portland, Maine, homes are still selling at almost as frenetic a pace as they were when mortgage rates were 3%. Lack of supply remains a major issue: For-sale inventory has risen but hasn’t recovered to anywhere near pre-pandemic levels, making bidding wars commonplace and keeping home price appreciation well above national averages.

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TOPICS: Business/Economy; Chit/Chat; Word For The Day
KEYWORDS: economy; finance; housing; market

[millenial4freedom]

unbelievable. only the Fed could've made Hartford the hottest market in the country.

[bk1000]

I would wager that 98%+ of those buyers are liberals. Let them pay.

[proxy_user]

You do understand it’s not the actual city of Hartford - nobody lives there but the ‘it’s them again’ crowd.

[catnipman]

blah, blah, blah: not much is going on right now in housing market that’s newsworthy, but we’re trying our damndest to pretend like shite is happening there so we can blame it on Trump ...

[BobL]

Illegals create upward pressure on prices by utilizing the lower-end housing stock. This ratchets all the way to neighborhoods where you can still park your car, outdoors, overnight.

While I have no evidence of any mass movements of Illegals within the US, I would not be surprised if they’re moving from red states to blue states, knowing that they’ll at least be safe from local law enforcement in blue states.

[Dr. Sivana]

You do understand it’s not the actual city of Hartford - nobody lives there but the ‘it’s them again’ crowd.

Hartford lost almost 1/3 of her population since 1970.

The "them" can be either black (42%) or Puerto Rican (33%). I worked on the West End of Hartford for three years, in West Hartford for three years, and in downtown Hartford for six months. You are correct. Densely populated Connecticut has numerous small cities surrounding Hartford, and not all of them rich (Avon and Farmington are upscale, as are parts of West Hartford). Decent regular folks (of all races) populate Wethersfield, Manchester, Berlin. Windsor Locks used to be a great area to get a moderately priced house (price driven down due to air traffic noise from Bradley airport).

[bgill]

Problem with that is Texas had a Kalifornican invasion a few years ago and they were paying anything the seller threw out and doubling it. Now, we have outrageous home prices and worse property taxes. Old dinky small homes that were selling for $60-75K in 1990 are now $2M.

[Tanniker Smith]

Because the northeast is still growing (though not as quickly as in the past, or as quickly as other places) but the available space to build upon has been used up.

It’s amazing to see pictures of the outer boroughs of NYC from not even 100 years ago. Wide open spaces that now have entire neighborhoods on them.