When Is The Best Time To List My Home?

Across the country, sellers are consulting their calendars to land on just the right time to list their properties.

Just like the temperature, the spring real estate market is heating up in our region, and buyers are anxious to get in on the action. Limited inventory still favors sellers, but there are strong signs that more homes will continue to be added, allowing buyers a better chance of finding a home that meets their needs.

It’s not a secret that the spring market is the busiest of the real estate cycle, but unlike local declarations of the change in season – “the first pitch of Nationals baseball” or the “first blooms of the Tidal Basin’s cherry blossoms” – there’s no clear date that sellers can peg for “The Best Day” to list their home. Locally, the “spring market” is loosely defined by many agents as “between the Super Bowl and Memorial Day,” which is pretty broad. If you’re looking to move soon and you can be flexible about your listing strategy, here’s what to consider.

Realtor.com’s annual “best time to sell” analysis identifies April 13-19 as the ideal new listing window based on seasonal trends in pricing, demand, and days on market (DOM) seen over the past seven years. But Zillow pushes their ideal date further out and predicts that, based on 2024 data, sellers who listed their home in the last two weeks of May netted an additional 1.6% on the sale, about $5,600 on the typical U.S. home.

Because all real estate is LOCAL, let’s take a look at the trends in our region, with the disclaimer that the best time to list your home is…when you need to move! Life changes can happen at any time, necessitating a move when you may least expect it. Factors like rising or falling interest rates (ex: higher interest rates are likely to keep would-be sellers in their current homes), consumer confidence, and the impact of cuts to the Federal workforce can also influence local market activity, throwing a potential curveball at well-crafted listing plans.

“In general, April and May tend to have the most available inventory, with March and June close behind. Same goes for new listings coming on the market,” says David Howell, CIO and a Principal of Corcoran McEnearney. “But it’s important to note that the relative supply doesn’t change as much as the actual inventory. And that’s because there are more buyers in the spring as well. So, the supply of homes – inventory and contracts – is only a little lower in the spring than it is in the winter months.”

“That wasn’t always the case,” says Howell. “Many years ago, we could count on the market being very quiet from Thanksgiving through most of January. But as our market grew more culturally diverse, the traditional seasonality waned to some degree.”

Another regional influence is the high number of military installations and the servicemembers who keep them operating, but even that impact is shifting from a spring/summer impact to one that is increasingly spread out over the year. “The summer months were always the biggest for military moves, but PCS (permanent change of station) moves in the military are now typically three years rather than two like they used to be, decreasing the number of moves military personnel would make,” Howell explains.

“What moves the market far more than the seasons is geography and major economic indicators – like mortgage rates and unemployment,” he adds.

As we head toward what could be peak Selling Season, what are the stats telling us about what to expect? BrightMLS, the mid-Atlantic database of real estate transactions, reports that year-to-date, new listings are up 10.4% in the D.C. region, compared to 4.8% for the overall Bright MLS service area. (This is higher than last year but is 5.3% lower than listing activity in the week prior.)

BrightMLS also reports that for the week ending March 23, the increase in local inventory is encouraging sellers to lower their prices, with the share of sellers dropping their asking price now two percentage points higher than it was a year ago. It had been anticipated that DOGE would cool housing market activity in the greater Washington, D.C. area, but BrightMLS reports that the uptick in new listing activity has drawn some sidelined buyers into the market.

“In the spring market, homes tend to go under contract about 10-15% faster, likely influenced by a combination of better weather that makes it easier to see and show houses and the simple fact that there are more buyers in the spring,” says Howell.

Sellers who are preparing to list soon should expect some negotiation from buyers who see, maybe, not “bargains” but “opportunities” with more homes to choose from. Buyer activity was relatively stronger in the D.C. area market than in other parts of the Mid-Atlantic region last week, with pending sales activity the strongest in the local markets where listing activity has increased the most.

If you’re planning to list within the next month or two to capture excited buyers and stand out from the competition, working with the experienced Realtors® at Corcoran McEnearney who understand the nuances of our local market will ensure your real estate goals are achieved no matter what season you’re selling.