Sellers Are Accepting Even Less | Jan. 2026 Housing Market Update

Buyers just got even more in control, and it’s excellent news for investors. Homes are now sitting on the market for the longest time in a decade, with sellers accepting thousands less than their original list price. For those who have been waiting to buy their first or next investment property, this could be the sign that it’s time to get in the game. But, with mortgage rates (slowly) coming down, will this window of opportunity last months or mere weeks? We’re back with our January 2026 housing market update! Dave is getting into it all—mortgage rates, inventory, demand, and why investors are becoming so bullish heading into this new year. Think there’s a housing crash on the way? Dave does his favorite thing—looks at data instead of guessing—to show some clear signs that those hoping for a crash will (unfortunately for them) be waiting quite a while. Demand is growing (steadily), and hungry homebuyers are itching to get back into the market. How much time do we have before steady appreciation returns? Stick around, we’re getting into it in this housing market update! In This Episode We Cover Sellers are accepting less: How much should you be bidding on houses? The best (and worst) housing markets in America (updated) Growing buyer demand and signs that the housing market (probably) won’t crash Why mortgage rates reversed after falling below 6% earlier this month Why investors are getting so bullish about rental properties in 2026 And So Much More! Check out more resources from this show on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠BiggerPockets.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.biggerpockets.com/blog/real-estate-1230 Interested in learning more about today’s sponsors or becoming a BiggerPockets partner yourself? Email ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠[email protected]⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dave Meyer?

  Better deal flow, huge regional differences, new variables in the mortgage market. 2026 is already off to a newsworthy start in the housing market. And today on the BiggerPockets podcast, we're giving you the updates and the insights you need to make smart investing decisions on your road to financial freedom. This is our January 2026 Housing Market Update.

• 0:27Dave Meyer?

  Hey, everyone. It's Dave, investor analyst, chief investment officer at BiggerPockets. And today on the show, we have our first housing market update of 2026. We do this format every single month. It is almost always our most popular episode of the month, but I particularly love doing this at the beginning of the year. It's maybe the most fun for me because we now know how everything ended up in 2025. And we're just starting to get a picture of what's in store for 2026. And even just a few weeks into it, we have a lot to talk about. In today's episode, we're going to cover housing prices in 2025 and where they're heading, including some new winners and losers for the massive regional differences we're seeing in performance.

• 1:11Dave Meyer?

  We'll talk about inventory shifts that are changing the whole way to think about buying new deals. We'll talk about some new variables impacting the volatile mortgage market we're in and new investor data that helps us understand how investors like you and me are planning to take advantage of new opportunities this year. So let's do it. Let's get into our January 2026 Housing Market Update. All right, first up, what's going on in the housing market? I'm going to start in a different place than we usually do. Because when you talk about a market, whether it's the housing market, stock market, used car market, whatever it is, there's a supply side and a demand side. And a lot of people in this industry, myself included, we talk a lot about inventory and the supply side. But I think possibly the most misunderstood

• 1:56Dave Meyer?

  part of the housing market right now is the demand side of the equation. A lot of people are out there saying, there's no buyers. There's no one coming through houses. And while there is some truth to this, Because sales are sluggish and there's certainly less demand than there was during COVID, which makes sense, right? Because prices are high now. Renting is often cheaper than buying. Mortgage rates are stubborn. There's a lot of uncertainty in the labor market and the global economy. It's understandable that there is less demand. But despite that, know what? Demand is up. Demand is actually up from where it was a year ago. The way that we measure this in the housing market is looking at mortgage purchase applications. The amount of people

• 2:40Dave Meyer?

  who are just applying to go out and buy a new home. It does not include refinances. This just looks at purchases and it is up. When you look at the Mortgage Bankers Association, it shows that it is about 10% higher than it was last year. So personally, I find this a little bit encouraging because I think we're all rooting for the housing market to recover. Now, I don't know if it's going to recover in terms of prices. I think some people would argue that prices need to drop more than they would. But when I say recover, I mean, we need more activity, right? Even if prices go down, it would be better for the housing market, for investors, for agents, for loan officers, for the whole industry, basically, if we had a higher sales volume.

• 3:19Dave Meyer?

  This past year, we had 4.1 million home sales. That's not a lot. Normally, it's 5.25. So we're like 20, 25% below where we were normally, or about half of where we were during COVID. And so we need to see this pick up. And the fact that demand has been ticking up for basically all of 2025, I think that's a good thing. And we're going to talk a little bit more about why that is in just a little bit. But I just wanted to start off with some good news about the housing market in 2026. Demand is higher than it was a year ago, and it's been on an upward trajectory, and maybe that will continue. Next, we're going to look at the supply side, right? We talked about demand. What's going on with supply? Now, a lot has been made about inventory

• 4:00Dave Meyer?

  of the last three years. We've had very low inventory. We have the lock-in effect. But over the last one or two years, we've started to see inventory go up. And it depends who you are, how you interpret that. Some people think that's good news. We need more inventory. I personally, I fall into that camp. I think we need more inventory in the housing market. Other people look at that and say, oh my God, the market is crashing. We're going to have so much inventory. It's 2008 all over again. Well, that's just not true. That is not what is going on. If you look at inventory, it is up, but it's only up 4% year over year. Not a lot. So all those people saying, oh my God, inventory is growing like crazy. Not really. It's actually going up less than I would personally like to see it.

• 4:45Dave Meyer?

  I'd like to see inventory go up even more. And that is not a level where we have to be concerned about a crash. Now, I'm not saying a crash can't happen, but if you're going to see a crash, you're going to see inventory go up way more than 4% year over year. And that's what we got in 2025. And that's actually a lower growth rate than we've seen in years. So just to be clear, inventory is up, but it's going up by less than it was a couple of months ago. And the reason this is happening is because we're seeing new listings drop. Now, these are two similar metrics, two important parts of the housing market. New listings and inventory, they sound similar. They're a little bit different.

• 5:26Dave Meyer?

  New listings is actually how many people go out, put their home on the MLS and list it for sale. Inventory is how many properties are for sale at a given point in time. So inventory is impacted by new listings, but it's also impacted by demand because you could have a lot of new listings. And if demand's really high, those get sold really quickly and inventory stays low. But the reason that inventory is moderating right now is not because demand is spiking. It's gone up a little bit, but it's not because it's spiking and eating up all those new listings. It's actually because new listings as of December 2025, the last month we have dated for, it's at the lowest point in two years. So fewer people are saying, hey, it's a good time to sell.

• 6:09Dave Meyer?

  And this is perfect characteristic of a correction and not a crash. We have been in a market that is worse and worse for sellers and better and better for buyers. Actually, there is a study that just came out from Redfin. It's a pretty amazing chart. I'll throw it up for people who are looking on YouTube. That it is the strongest buyer's market on Record. Now, take this with a grain of salt because Redfin doesn't go back in time. Their data only goes back to 2013. So this is not during the great recession. But you know, for the last 12 years, we're in the best buyer's market that we have seen. And when sellers see that and say, hey, buyers have all of the power in this market. They're like, I don't want to sell right now. I'm not going to get a good price.

• 6:51Dave Meyer?

  I'm not going to get good terms and therefore I'm not choosing to list my property for sale. And so when you take these things into account, when you look at both demand being, you know, up a little bit, when you see inventory going up, but not that much, you get a pretty balanced market. Right? If you have a relative balance between supply and demand, you're going to see a pretty flat market. And that's exactly what we saw. I actually said in the beginning of last year, about one year ago, that we were probably going to have a pretty flat market back in 2025. And that's exactly what happened. We have a pretty balanced market. We actually get the final numbers here from Redfin. They're kind of the first people to issue this. We hear from other sources like Case Schiller and Zillow a little bit later. But Redfin says that last

• 7:36Dave Meyer?

  year, year-over-year growth was just 0.5%. That's as darn close to flat as you can pretty much imagine. And so we had a flat year in the housing market in 2025. This is part of the thesis I've had about being in the great stall. Just to remind everyone, I think we are going to be in a flat market for several years, barring some black swan event or some crazy geopolitical thing that happens or quantitative easing. If we stay on the path we're on, I think that we are going to have several flat years in the housing market. Last year, that proved correct. And so far in 2026, when we're looking at the supply and demand data that I've been talking about, it looks like we're staying on that trajectory. Now, of course, there are huge regional differences.

• 8:19Dave Meyer?

  We've seen this for the last couple of years, but during COVID, everyone got used to every market going up. That's not normally what happens in the market. We still have some markets that are growing like crazy. Detroit up 9% year-over-year. Newark, New Jersey, 8%. Warren, Michigan, 8%. New York City, 5%. Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, places in Wisconsin, all up above the pace of inflation. We have several markets, a couple dozen markets, basically, that have real price growth. That's inflation-adjusted price growth. But the number of cities that are seeing corrections is growing. Dallas now takes the spot. Austin, its neighbor, just a few hours away. We were just there on the Texas Roadshow. Dallas now takes the spot for the biggest declines in pricing in the country at negative 8%

• 9:02Dave Meyer?

  year over year, followed by Oakland, California at 6%. Austin's still up there, still top three worst performing markets at minus 4%. San Jose, Miami, all there. Basically, you know, when you look at the top 10, top 20 worst performing markets, they're all in California, Florida and Texas. Three of the biggest population and landmass states in the country. I don't know what to make of that, but those are the worst performing markets right now. A couple of other things to note, just about housing market conditions that can help inform your decision making is that the typical home days on market actually spent 60 days on market. That is the longest it's taken to sell a home in more than a decade. I'm sure anyone who's flipping a house is feeling that right now and that hurts.

• 9:47Dave Meyer?

  But for anyone who's looking to buy a house, that's really good news. This is one of the things that we are seeing in the market that you as an investor should be taking advantage of, right? If you're seeing homes sit on the market longer, that is an invitation for you to bid below asking price, right? We already seeing a flat market. We are seeing homes sit on the market longer. These are conditions where sellers, if they want to move their home, they are often going to have to sell below list price. And this isn't just me saying that. This is actually a measurable thing that you see in the data. The average home right now is selling for 2% below list price. So you as an investor, that means you should be offering at most 98% of what the list

• 10:32Dave Meyer?

  price is, and that's average. That's for home buyers. As an investor, you should be thinking, how do I get even more equity out of this deal? How do I buy this thing for five, seven, 10% below list price? And frankly, you should not just be thinking about list price. One of the main tips I've been giving people, and you should remember for buying in this kind of market is buy below comps. Don't just take what the seller wants for their property and say, I'll get 2% below that. Figure out for yourself with your agent or doing your own comps, figure out what the property is really worth in today's market, not 2022, not 2023, what is it worth today? And get a discount on that. That is the best way to invest in a flat market, right? Because you're still getting equity because you're buying below current comps.

• 11:17Dave Meyer?

  You're not waiting for the market to grow for you. You're getting your equity through negotiation. And the fact that properties are sitting on the market for 60 days means that you have leverage in that negotiation. All right, so that's the big picture stuff that's going on in the housing market. But we obviously want to turn our attention to what's going to happen in 2026 and if this trend is going to continue. And as we've talked about a lot on this show, I think because affordability is so low, the direction of the housing market is really going to be dictated by the direction of mortgage rates. And we're going to talk about which way mortgage rates are going right after this break. Most investors only think about insurance when something goes wrong. A tenant injury, storm damage, loss of rent.

• 12:01Dave Meyer?

  Then suddenly, the cheapest policy doesn't feel like the best one anymore. That's why a lot of BiggerPockets investors use steadily for landlord insurance designed specifically for rental properties. Whether you own one property or a growing portfolio, they make it simple to get covered properly. And BiggerPockets Pro members get an extra 5% off their landlord insurance premiums. Visit biggerpockets.com/landlordinsurance to get a quote today.

• 12:29Henry Washington?

  Here's a strategy that most W2 employees have never heard of. Normally, if you want to write off a rental property against your regular income, you need real estate professional status. That means tracking hundreds of hours a year. Rent to Retirement just launched a program that skips all of that. It's called the STR loophole tenant placement program. Here's how it works. You buy one of Rent to Retirement's Class A new construction investment properties. You set up an Airbnb listing and self-manage it for the remainder of the year. Rent to Retirement then rents the home as a short-term rental to establish it as an STR for the year, no furnishing required, making this the easy button to set up. Five or six figures in taxes this year.

• 13:11Henry Washington?

  And because you're the sole manager, there's no hourly minimum to meet. That lets you use a cost segregation study to accelerate the depreciation and potentially write off over $100,000 against your income, even on your first rental. Add in cash back up to 13% of the home price, which exceeds $60,000 on some properties. With this massive cash back incentives, investors are seeing total returns up to 126%. New construction, A-class properties, and inventory is limited. Learn more at biggerpockets.com/retirement or text REI to 33777. Again, text REI to 33777.

• 13:53Dave Meyer?

  I just booked a backpacking trip through Olympic National Park. Two nights out on the trail, no cell service, nothing to do but eat trail mix and stare at mountains I'll never get tired of. That's the whole appeal. But while I'm off-grid, my place doesn't need to sit empty. I can list my space on Airbnb and make a little extra income while I'm away. And with Airbnb's co-host network, I could partner with a vetted local co-host to help take care of the details, from guest communications to onsite support, so I can fully unplug and enjoy my time out in the backcountry. If you've got upcoming travel plans, you can find a co-host at airbnb.com/host.

• 14:35Speaker 02

  Hey Spotify listeners. When you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admirals Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In-flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi, sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at aa.com.

• 15:04Dave Meyer?

  Welcome back to the BiggerPockets Podcast. I'm Dave Meyer. This is our January 2026 housing market update. Before the break, we talked about basic housing market conditions that are going on, and now we're going to turn our attention to what happens from here, because mortgage rates are our big predictor of the market this year. Now, that's not some hot take. I'm sure everyone is saying that, but if you haven't listened to some of these shows before, I'll just briefly give you my thesis about the housing market. All comes down to affordability. It's too unaffordable to buy homes in most of these markets. And so, we need something to get better in terms of affordability if we're going to see the housing market increase in terms of volume and pricing. Now, there are three parts of

• 15:47Dave Meyer?

  affordability. Home prices, which we've said are flat, wages, which are going up, but that takes a really long time, and mortgage rates. So if we're expecting something in affordability to change dramatically in the next year, it's probably going to be mortgage rates. I'm not saying that's what's going to happen. It's just has the biggest potential to change out of any of those three variables. So I really think we're going to need to watch mortgage rates closely this year. We want to understand the housing market. Now, we started this year, 2026, with mortgage rates around 6.25%. Which doesn't sound amazing to people, but just want to call out, that is a full percentage point below where we were a year ago. That's worth celebrating. The reason why I said

• 16:29Dave Meyer?

  demand was up over the last year, it's because affordability got better. Prices were flat. Wages went up. Mortgage rates went down modestly. That's a combination for affordability getting better. Not a lot better. We got a long way to go, but it's still better than where it was a year ago. And that's really good news. Now, we've had some interesting moves in terms of mortgage rates since the beginning of the year. Now, if you looked at the exact right second, you probably noticed that the 30-year fix, the average mortgage rate on the 30-year fix, actually dropped under 6 for just a minute. If you blinked, you probably missed it because it was at 5.99 for just a single day. It was

• 17:11Dave Meyer?

  beautiful while it lasted, but it did not last. As of today, it is back up to 6.2%.

• 17:18Dave Meyer?

  Now, the reason it dropped down was because the Trump administration announced $200 billion of mortgage-backed security buying by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. And I talked about this in detail. If you want to listen and understand this in detail, back in December, I did a mortgage rate prediction for 2026, and I talked about mortgage-backed securities and how the government can actually move mortgage rates down without the Fed, because the Fed, as you've seen, when the Fed lowers rates, it does not move mortgage rates right now. Sometimes they are related, but they're not directly correlated. They are not linked in lockstep. Mortgage-backed security buying is different. When the government buys mortgage-backed securities, mortgage rates almost always go

• 18:02Dave Meyer?

  down, and that's what we're seeing, $200 billion of that, not enough to move the market significantly. But experts say that that alone has taken 0.25 or 25 basis points off your mortgage rate. So that's what brought us from 6.25 at the beginning of the year down to 6%. So although there has been some encouraging signs, I don't think we have seen the magical piece of either policy or economic news or anything else that is really going to move mortgage rates beyond my predictions. I said last year, I think the range is going to be 5.5 to 6.5, sticking with that. I said the average for the year is going to be around 6.1%. We're probably about that for the year right now. It's going to be volatile.

• 18:47Dave Meyer?

  It's going to go up and down, but that's where my average is for the year. And unfortunately, I think that means we are only going to get modest improvements for affordability in the housing market this year. What we've seen is wages keep growing. I think they're going to compress a little bit, but I'm optimistic that wages are going to keep growing this year. I think we're going to have another flat year of housing prices, maybe a little bit down. And so I do think affordability is going to improve this year, but it's going to be very modest. It's certainly not getting back to COVID levels. It's not getting back to 2010 levels. I don't even think it's getting back to historical levels, but this is what I mean by the great stall. This is going to take time. I've literally been saying this since 2020. These are the things that have to happen for three, four, or five years before the housing market

• 19:32Dave Meyer?

  becomes healthy again. We're three years into it, and I think we have two or three years more, unless something crazy happens. Now, will something crazy happen? I don't know. The world feels a little crazy to me right now. Like, we might get quantitative easing this year. That's literally the trillion-dollar question for 2026. But as long as things stay in the realm of normal, I think we're staying for a boring year in the housing market. Slow sales, flat to modestly declining prices, but modestly improving affordability. So before we move on from mortgage rates, though, I do wanted to say one other quick thing. You know, a lot is made in the media about delinquencies and foreclosure. Personally, I think it's a lot of

• 20:13Dave Meyer?

  fear mongering at the current rate, because if you actually look at it, delinquencies across the board, the number of people not paying their mortgage, probably the number one indicator for a market crash, delinquencies, they went down last month, both for 30 days and 90 days. So I know people say it takes a while for them to work their way through the courts. If you look at it at almost every level, delinquencies are actually down. Active foreclosures are actually up. They're up 20% from last year because we did see the ending of certain programs, FHA and VA loans. There is a moratorium on foreclosures for a while. That was up last year, so they nationally went up, but they are already starting to level out, according to the data that we're seeing. And I

• 20:56Dave Meyer?

  just want to call out, even though foreclosures are up 20% year over year, you're going to see that on social media, I promise you. Someone who's trying to sell you something or to scare you is going to tell you that foreclosure rates are up 20% year over year. But remember this, they are still 40% below pre-pandemic levels. No one was freaking out about foreclosures in 2019. Maybe you weren't investing then, but no one was talking about foreclosures because it wasn't a problem. And we are still 40% below that. So just keep that in mind if you hear this news. I just want everyone to know, there is no forced selling. We're seeing new listings at the lowest point it's been in two years, and we're seeing delinquencies down. Those are two signs that the market is not going to crash.

• 21:41Dave Meyer?

  Right now, there is no evidence of a market crash. The slow recovery of affordability, the slow recovery of the housing market. It's not the sexiest thing. That's why not a lot of people talk about it, but it is the most likely scenario. And it's exactly what's playing out right now. So for the immediate future, just to summarize, things look on track for forecasts. We're going to take a quick break, but after that break, I'm going to share some insights into how the BiggerPockets community, all of you listening to this podcast, our community here, is planning to take advantage of the many opportunities that are seen in the market this year. We'll get to that right after this quick break. Stay with us. For my wife's birthday, I wanted to make her a new website for her landscape design business.

• 22:25Dave Meyer?

  So I researched a lot of different options. I tried out a couple, but honestly, it was really overwhelming. It was pretty time consuming and still the site wasn't coming out the way I wanted it to. Then I tried Hostinger and everything was super simple. I asked Hostinger's AI to build a clean site for her business and it had a working version up in minutes. No coding or designer needed. Plus, its AI agent helps with SEO, website copy and email marketing after launch. You get domain, website, email, all in one account. And right now you can get Black Friday and Cyber Monday pricing through December 14th. So snag Hostinger's services at their lowest prices before the sale ends.

• 23:10Dave Meyer?

  Create your website today for just $1.99. Go to hostinger.com/realestate and use code REALESTATE for an additional 10% off Black Friday and Cyber Monday pricing. I just booked a ski trip to Park City and I've already got the whole thing planned out. Five days, first tracks every morning before the crowd show up, my knees reminding me I'm not 25 anymore by the second run and an embarrassing number of overpriced burritos at the lodge. I don't even care. This is the trip I look forward to all year. But here's the part I actually appreciate, the practical side of my brain kicking in. Is that my place doesn't have to just sit there empty the whole time I'm away.

• 23:52Dave Meyer?

  I can list my space on Airbnb and bring in a little extra income while I'm out getting humbled on a mountain. And with the co-host network, I'm not the one handling all of it. You can partner with a vetted local co-host who can create your listing, manage reservations, message guests, and even handle the styling. So I get to fully focus on my trip and my place is still working for me the whole time. Find a co-host at Airbnb.com/host. Investing in real estate has always been smart, but it hasn't always been simple. Now it's both, thanks to the Fundrise Flagship Fund. The Fundrise Flagship Fund launched more than five years ago with a mission of delivering low-fee access to blue-chip private market real estate.

• 24:36Dave Meyer?

  Today, the Fundrise Flagship Fund has grown to manage more than $1 billion of real estate on behalf of hundreds of thousands of investors, making it one of the largest funds of its kind. For those who believe real estate has an important role to play in their portfolio strategy, the Fundrise Flagship Fund has positioned itself as both a simple and a smart option. Whether you're starting with $10 or $10,000, the Fundrise Flagship Fund makes adding real estate's unique potential for both passive income and consistent growth, just visit Fundrise.com/pockets to make your first investment today. Carefully consider the investment objectives, risks, charges, and expenses of the Fundrise Flagship Fund before investing.

• 25:20Dave Meyer?

  This and other information can be found in the fund's prospectus at Fundrise.com/flagship. This is a paid advertisement.

• 25:28Speaker 02

  Hey Spotify listeners, when you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admirals Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi, sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at AA.com.

• 25:55Speaker 03

  This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome, that's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50-page restoration blog, or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online make sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required. Compatibility and availability varies 18 plus.

• 26:24Dave Meyer?

  Welcome back to the BiggerPockets Podcast. I'm Dave Meyer. This is our January 2026 housing market update. Before the break, we talked about mortgage rates. We also talked about basic housing market conditions that show that we are in the great stall. And a lot of the principles, the ideas, the tactics that work that I've talked about in the great stall are still working. So that's good news, right? If you want to listen to some episodes about more tactical stuff, you can go back. We've done a lot of episodes about the great stall or the upside era. Those are still things that work in this market. So great news for us and in this community. But it's not just my ideas that matter, right? We actually at BiggerPockets wanted to go out and learn, are people optimistic? What do people think about the great stall? Is it a good time to invest?

• 27:09Dave Meyer?

  And we've collected that data. And I want to share with you some insights here because I think that has real practical applications here for our community. It might give you some confidence and some ideas about how to grow your own portfolio here in 2026. The big headline from the data is investors are optimistic. I don't care what your uncle says or what everyone else says about the housing market right now. Frankly, for homeowners, it's a tough time to buy a primary residence right now in a lot of places if you're not going to do value add. But for investors, people are feeling rightfully so, in my opinion, that conditions are improving and are feeling that they're going to get even better here in 2026.

• 27:53Dave Meyer?

  We found this out because we basically asked two different questions. The first one is like, how do you invest in conditions compared to a year ago? And how are they going to change? And if you look at the answers, people didn't. Feel like last year was very good and I like that because I think it lends us a little bit of credibility. Right? Like if people were like, last year was great. Next year is going to be even greater. There are some bias in that data, right? Well, maybe it's because we're polling real estate investors. But people are pretty honest that 2025 stunk. You know, I talked to Henry, we were on the road show and he was just talking like 2025 kicked a lot of people's asses. Let's just be honest about it. But 2026, people are feeling better about because it's a little bit more predictable.

• 28:35Dave Meyer?

  25 was the time we went from a market where prices were going up every year, you know, we still in despite high rates in 23 and 24. Prices were going up five, six, seven, eight percent for a flipper, for any sort of buy and hold investor, for a bur investor. Those are good conditions. Now, when you're buying in 2025, assuming those things are going to continue. But we get a flat year. That makes for a tough year for a lot of investors. Now I did some good deals. I think a lot of people did good deals, but that's a tough year to navigate. But since we're in 2026, people are feeling optimistic because the housing market is more predictable. I think we know that we're in a great stall and we are seeing housing prices start to come down. Negotiating positions are better. We actually asked, we were like, why are you so optimistic?

• 29:20Dave Meyer?

  Right? Because maybe people are just optimists, but the reasons that people cited for their optimism in the housing market is number one. They think more rates. That's not by a lot. I do think rates will come down a little bit. Like I said, I think last year was averaging in the six, you know, mid sixes. I think it will be low sixes this year. So that's true. But the two other ones, which are almost equal in terms of popularity for the biggest opportunity in residential real estate this year was better ability to negotiate. I love that. That's exactly what we were talking about early in the episode. I think this is the number one tactical thing that people should be doing right now, being super patient and negotiating.

• 29:59Dave Meyer?

  And number two, better deal flow, better inventory. I've said this recently, but there are just better deals on the market. There are three things in combination, better deal flow, better ability to negotiate and potentially better mortgage rates. Those are great. For anyone who wants to be a buy and hold investor, you're seeing better assets, things that you really want to hold on to. You have a better ability to earn equity through negotiation. You don't even have to do anything other than negotiate, but you can do that. And number three, if you get affordability improvements, that's going to increase your cash flow. All those things combined are good reasons to be optimistic. I understand why optimism is increasing. And I want everyone in the audience to think of these three things

• 30:44Dave Meyer?

  as tactical things that you can be doing. Now, you don't control mortgage rates, so that's not one. But better ability to negotiate, increasing inventory, these are things that you should be taking with you from this episode right now. You have more opportunity to look at deals, so go look at all of them. Look at more stuff. If you were analyzing three deals a week last year, do eight right now because I promise you there's more stuff for you to look at and you should look at as many of them as you can because you don't know which seller is going to be the most willing to negotiate with you. Now, like I said, your ability to negotiate is absolutely going up. Don't get me wrong, but not every seller is willing to accept a lower price.

• 31:26Dave Meyer?

  Not every seller has had their property sit on the market long enough for them to accept, hey, what I'm asking for is not really reasonable and I'm going to have to accept a lower offer. Those are not in your control, but patience in your negotiation, that is in your control. And that's what the BiggerPockets community is planning to do this year and what I encourage all of you listening here today to do in your own investing as well. Now, among our audience, not super surprising here, but by far the most popular strategy for next year is long-term rentals. That includes birth, that includes rent by the room, it includes house hacking, stuff like that. Flipping is the second most popular and I was kind of surprised to see,

• 32:09Dave Meyer?

  we've seen midterm and short-term rentals fall below both of those pretty far over the last couple of years. I think what people are seeing now with this flat housing market is maybe it's time to just go back to buying great assets that you want to hold on to for the next 10 years. What I've recommended when we talk about the upside era and the great stall that we're in. It's time to buy great assets that you want to hold on to forever. And that's the plan of the bigger pockets community right now. Now, I don't want to pretend that everything is rosy. There are real challenges in the housing market, and I just want to call out the number one challenge. Because I think this is something we all need to keep an eye on. It's rising expenses. I actually thought it was going to be bad deal flow, or I don't have enough money, or I don't know what to do next.

• 32:52Dave Meyer?

  But rising expenses, especially among experienced investors, are by far the biggest challenge that people are seeing. So this is something I encourage everyone to keep a really close eye on as they manage their portfolio. I am guilty of this. I think everyone who's a real estate investor is guilty of this at some point in your investing. But you're like, I analyzed that deal. It gets a 9% cash on cash return. I'm fine. But like, did you reanalyze that deal in year two, in year three, in year four? Because if you have seen your taxes go up, like everyone, if you've seen your insurance go up, like everyone, your maintenance costs go up, maybe that's not getting 9%. Maybe it's getting 4%. Maybe it's getting 2%.

• 33:37Dave Meyer?

  And maybe that's just something you have to deal with right now during this kind of market until rents start going up, which I do think will happen in the latter half of this year, maybe into next year. But I digress. What I'm saying is maybe that's something you deal with. But the other thing is, maybe you could be doing something to better optimize that portfolio. That might mean adding value. Maybe you can renovate and get more rents. Maybe you can add an ADU and get more rents. Maybe instead of renovating, you sell that property and turn it into something else. But I highly recommend, it's the beginning of the year. It's a great time to do this. If you have not done this yet, take some time and reanalyze your deals. Go look at what your expenses at, how have they changed over the last year?

• 34:20Dave Meyer?

  Are they growing faster than your rent? Is your return on equity increasing or decreasing? If you don't know how to do these things, you can check out BiggerPockets. We have tons of resources. Both of my books cover these things. You can check those out there, but go do that. Go analyze your deals right now because I agree that this is a big challenge for real estate investors, but it's really only a big challenge if you don't know what's happening. Well, it's actually just a bigger challenge if you don't know what's happening, right? If you're just sitting there like, oh, expenses are fine, they might not be. So go and make sure that your deals are still performing. This is one great insight from the BiggerPockets community. I think you should all take away here today. Last thing I wanted to mention that despite those challenges, and they are real, by far, most

• 35:02Dave Meyer?

  BiggerPockets community members are planning to grow. Nearly 60% of them are planning to increase their portfolio size this next year. 25% are saying that they're going to optimize their existing portfolio, and only 4% are planning to sell. So I just wanted to share that because I know there's a lot of noise and media attention to the housing market. A lot of people are saying this industry is dead or it doesn't work. I completely disagree. It's just a change of tactics. And if you follow some of the plans that we've talked about on the show, that we talk about every week on this show, there are absolutely still great ways to increase your portfolio. And generally speaking, that's what the BiggerPockets community is planning to do in 2026. I hope that's the plan for you all as well. And even if you don't plan to buy, think about ways to optimize your

• 35:47Dave Meyer?

  portfolio. Think about ways to put yourself in a position to buy next year, improve your financial situation. All of that is still investing. Like, you don't have to go and transact. It's all about the mindset of putting yourself in a position to grow your portfolio long term. That might not mean you're buying today, or next month, or maybe even not this year. But keep listening, keep learning, and keep putting yourself in a position so that you can strike when the time is right for you. That's the game plan for me for 2026, and it's what I recommend for all of you. Thanks so much for listening for our January 2026 Housing Market Update. I'm Dave Meyer with BiggerPockets, and we'll see you all next time.

• 37:03Speaker 04

  Dips at every dinner party. I make non-grilled cheese when my daughter has friends over.

• 37:08Dave Meyer?

  I use StoneFire Non to reward the humans who do my bidding.

• 37:12Speaker 04

  Right, it's perfect for camping trips.

• 37:15Dave Meyer?

  Dance for it, feeble mortal.

• 37:16Speaker 04

  Sorry, is he talking to me or?

• 37:19Dave Meyer?

  Dance.

• 37:22Speaker 04

  From our tradition to yours, StoneFire. Together we non.