Throughout 2025, we’ve seen a ton of inventory added to the market, and that trend certainly continued throughout March, as 2,046 new single-family homes hit the market! This represents a 16.78% increase over last March. However, demand could not keep up with all of the new supply hitting the market. 1,232 homes were sold throughout the month of March, which only represented an 11.59% increase compared to last year.
When you combine the fact that more supply was added in the month of March than sold with the fact that there has been an unprecedented number of homes listed so far this year, you have a recipe for a drastic increase in inventory. This is exactly what we’re seeing, as the number of active listings is up by 47.79% when compared to March 2024!
Despite high inventory levels, homes are still moving quickly!
When you see that there’s nearly 50% more inventory than there was last year, and nowhere near a 50% increase in demand, you might think that homes are sitting on the market for extended periods of time. However, that couldn’t be further from the truth in the East Bay. The average home is only sitting on the market for 12 days in Alameda County and 13 days in Contra Costa County. Although these figures are certainly up from last year, that’s still an incredibly short amount of time for a home to sit on the market!
Sellers have the negotiating power in the SFH market, while buyers have the power in the condo market!
When determining whether a market is a buyers’ market or a sellers’ market, we look to the Months of Supply Inventory (MSI) metric. The state of California has historically averaged around three months of MSI, so any area with at or around three months of MSI is considered a balanced market. Any market that has lower than three months of MSI is considered a sellers’ market, whereas markets with more than three months of MSI are considered buyers’ markets.
When it comes to the East Bay, the single-family home market is a sellers’ market, despite all of the inventory that has been piling up. Right now, there is roughly 1.8 months of SFH supply on the market in Alameda County, and 2 months’ worth of supply on the market in Contra Costa County. However, there’s a bit of a different story when it comes to condos. Buyers have slightly more leverage in the condo market, with 4.1 months of supply on the market in Alameda County and 3.4 months of supply on the market in Contra Costa County.
