The number of homes available for sale in Pennsylvania reached a three-year high in July, which is helping move the state toward a balanced housing market, the local real estate agents group said.
The Keystone State had 42,270 homes on the market last month, up 9.5% from July 2024, the Pennsylvania Association of Realtors said in a recent report. The figure also marks a 1.5% increase from June.
Inventory is important to track within a local housing market because, as economists have noted, having more supply typically helps temper prices. Pennsylvania has seen years of low inventory, which played a role in rising prices and buyer competition, PAR President Bill Lublin said in a statement.
"We’re continuing to see a strong increase in housing inventory, reaching levels we haven’t seen since 2023," Lublin said. "For the market overall, an increase in inventory points toward a healthier balance, supporting more sustainable pricing."
Lublin said inventory has not spiked equally across all properties, noting that homes with higher price points have a larger months' inventory, particularly those priced over $1 million.
"More moderately priced homes, between $125,000 and $374,999, continue to have greater inventory challenges," he said in a blog post analyzing the July numbers.
Inventory may be climbing statewide, but listings fell in July in the Lehigh Valley, as did in some central Pennsylvania counties, including Cumberland and Lancaster.
Pennsylvania has spent years lagging in residential real estate construction, and those delays have led to a statewide housing shortage, according to a March study from the Pew Research Center. Inventory is now growing, in part, because homebuilders have been busy constructing developments in some of the state's smallest communities. For example, Pulte Homes completed a condominium tower in Conshohocken this year, and Lennar began offering newly built single-family homes in Perkiomenville in April.
Meanwhile, Toll Brothers is finishing a new development in Collegeville — featuring 55 single-family homes — that's slated to open this winter.
Thousands of existing homes are for sale in Pennsylvania as well. The listings include a four-bedroom ranch in Erie for $240,000, a four-bedroom Victorian in Scranton for $249,000 and a three-bedroom townhouse in York for $245,000.
The state's median home price grew 6.5% to $320,000 in July compared to a year ago, the real estate agents group said. In a month-to-month comparison, prices fell from $325,000 in June. The group noted that June to July marked the first time this year that median prices dipped.
The number of homes sold remained roughly the same from last year — at 11,450 in July, the group said. That figure suggests real estate agents "are continuing to see strong demand from buyers and multiple offers on competitively priced homes," Lublin said.
The group's market report — which does not include days on market — noted that the state had 4.3 months' worth of inventory in July. Six months' worth of inventory is usually considered a balanced housing market.
