If you’ve been house-hunting in Texas this year, you’ve probably noticed something that wasn’t true a few years ago: there’s actually room to negotiate.
The Texas Real Estate Research Center at Texas A&M projected in its 2026 forecast that statewide home sales would rise a modest 2.5% this year, to roughly 349,000 new and existing homes, with the median price up about 1.3% to around $334,000. Texas Realtors’ first-quarter 2026 report backed that up on the sales side — statewide closed sales were up 0.7% year-over-year — but showed the median price actually slipping 0.8% to $328,000, the first year-over-year quarterly price decline the state has seen in more than a decade. Roughly half of Texas metro areas saw sales increase in the quarter and half saw decreases, with Abilene (up 22.9%) and McAllen (up 17.5%) posting the strongest gains.
The metro-level picture varies widely. Austin has led the state’s price correction, with some estimates showing year-over-year declines approaching 6% and industry forecasts suggesting that softness could persist longer there than in Dallas, Houston, or San Antonio. Dallas-Fort Worth has also cooled from its pandemic-era highs, with different data sources putting the metro’s median sale price anywhere from roughly $300,000 to the mid-$400,000s depending on how the boundary is drawn — a reminder that “median home price” numbers can vary sharply by source and geography. Houston and San Antonio have held up more steadily, with smaller year-over-year price movements in either direction.
Local numbers tell a similar story of a buyer-friendlier market. In the greater Houston area, September 2026 snapshots for suburbs like Katy and Cypress showed thousands of active listings, homes sitting on the market for around 77–78 days on average, and average sale prices running close to — or in Cypress’s case, above — list price. That’s a notable change from a few years ago, when bidding wars routinely pushed homes well over asking price within days.
Rising inventory is the common thread. Statewide, Texas’s months-of-inventory supply climbed from 2.7 months in the third quarter of 2024 to 3.7 months a year later, moving the market closer to the traditional six-month benchmark for balance between buyers and sellers, though still short of it. Analysts broadly describe the current environment as a correction and stabilization rather than a crash, pointing to continued job and population growth, an inventory level still well below historical crash indicators, and interest rates that some expect to ease further.
What it means locally: buyers in most Texas metros now have more homes to consider and more negotiating leverage than at any point since before the pandemic, while sellers — especially in Austin — will likely need sharper pricing and stronger listing presentation to compete for a smaller pool of active buyers.
Sources: Texas Real Estate Research Center, Texas A&M University; Texas Realtors 2026 Q1 Quarterly Housing Report; HAR.com/Marysol Calvillo September 2026 market update; ManageCasa and NoradaRealEstate market analyses.
