Boise Real Estate Market: You’re Asking the Wrong Question
“How’s the real estate market?”
It might be the question I get asked more than any other.
And my answer?
Which market?
I know. Annoying Realtor answer to a perfectly reasonable question.
But stay with me, because this matters if you’re thinking about buying or selling a home anywhere in the Treasure Valley.
We love simple labels.
The market is hot.
The market is slow.
It’s a buyer’s market.
It’s a seller’s market.
Prices are going up.
Prices are coming down.
And every one of those statements could potentially be true at exactly the same time.
Because there really isn’t one Boise real estate market.
There isn’t one Meridian market.
And there definitely isn’t one giant Treasure Valley housing market where every house, every buyer and every seller is having the same experience.
So before you make a real estate decision based on what you heard on the news, read online or—heaven help us—from your neighbor who sold a house once in 2007, we need to talk about what “the market” actually means.
Let's Start With the Big Picture
As I recorded this month's video, the latest complete numbers available were for August.
In Ada County, 955 single-family homes sold during the month.
The median sales price was $595,000.
Average days on market was 37.
Inventory stood at 1,979 homes, or about 2.4 months of supply.
Great.
So, how's the market?
You still don't know.
Those numbers aren't useless. Far from it. They give us a valuable 30,000-foot view of what's happening across Ada County.
But here's the problem:
You're probably not buying Ada County.
And you're probably not selling Ada County either.
You're buying or selling one house.
And that house exists inside a much smaller market.
So let's zoom in.
Same County. Same Month. Two Completely Different Markets.
Here's one of my favorite examples from the August numbers because it demonstrates this perfectly.
There were 991 existing—or resale—homes available in Ada County.
There were 988 new-construction homes available.
That's almost identical.
If we stopped there, you might assume those two markets were behaving pretty similarly.
Nope.
Existing homes had approximately 1.9 months of inventory and were averaging around 30 days on market.
New construction had approximately 3.4 months of inventory and was averaging around 54 days on market.
Read that again.
Almost the exact same number of available homes.
Same county.
Same month.
But one segment had nearly twice as much supply relative to demand and homes were taking almost twice as long to sell.
That is not one market.
And we haven't even separated Boise from Meridian.
Or Eagle from Kuna.
Or a $425,000 house from an $850,000 house.
Or a beautifully updated home from the one with the original 1996 brass fixtures and burgundy carpet.
Not judging the burgundy carpet.
Okay. Maybe a little.
Your ZIP Code Isn't Even Specific Enough
Here's where this gets even more interesting.
People sometimes assume that once we narrow things down geographically, we've found their market.
Not necessarily.
Two homes can be three streets apart and still compete in somewhat different markets.
One might be a single-level home—which could attract buyers specifically searching for that.
One might have a four-car garage.
One might back to a busy road.
One might have an incredible backyard.
One might need $50,000 worth of updating.
One might be competing directly against a builder offering a shiny new house with a financing incentive.
Location matters enormously.
But location isn't the only thing defining your market.
Price point matters.
Property type matters.
Condition matters.
Features matter.
And most importantly:
The buyer's alternatives matter.
Because your competition isn't determined by which houses you think are comparable.
Your competition is determined by what the buyer considering your home could buy instead.
That distinction matters.
A lot.
Here's Another Number That Can Fool You
Ada County's median sales price in August was $595,000.
That's within roughly $7,000 of the monthly record we saw back in 2022.
Wait a minute.
Does that mean we're basically back in the 2022 market?
Absolutely not.
And this is exactly why one statistic without context can get people into trouble.
Yes, the median price is similar.
The market conditions are not.
Think back to 2021 and early 2022.
Buyers were competing differently.
Offers were being written differently.
Sellers had dramatically different leverage.
Inventory was different.
Interest rates were different.
And buyers sometimes had approximately eleven seconds to decide whether they loved a house.
Okay, maybe they had twelve.
Today's buyer has a different set of concerns.
What's my monthly payment?
How much cash will I need to close?
What will this house need after I buy it?
Will the seller contribute toward closing costs?
Can we negotiate repairs?
Could we use seller concessions toward an interest-rate buydown?
And if there's new construction nearby, what is the builder offering?
Those things matter because buyers don't purchase a median sales price.
They purchase a home and a monthly payment.
Sellers: Stop Asking What Homes in Boise Are Selling For
If you're considering selling, one of the least useful questions you can ask me is:
“What are homes in Boise selling for?”
My answer is going to be somewhere between $200,000 and several million dollars.
Very helpful.
Instead, we need to ask:
What are homes like yours selling for?
And even that is just the beginning.
What's happening in your neighborhood?
What's happening in your price range?
How many similar homes are currently available?
How many have actually sold?
How long did they take?
Were there price reductions?
What condition were they in?
What did they ultimately sell for compared with the original asking price?
And here's the one sellers sometimes forget:
What else can your buyer purchase for the same money?
Because buyers don't tour your home and then go sit quietly in their car contemplating only your house.
They're scrolling.
They're touring.
They're comparing.
They may be looking at your 15-year-old resale at 10:00 in the morning and walking through brand-new construction at 11:30.
If that builder is offering an incentive that changes their monthly payment by hundreds of dollars, we need to understand that.
That doesn't automatically mean you slash your price.
It means we need to know what problem we're actually solving.
Buyers: “Is This a Good Time to Buy?” Isn't Much Better
Buyers tend to ask the opposite version of the same question:
“Is now a good time to buy?”
Maybe.
Maybe not.
I know. Incredibly satisfying answer.
But your real question should be:
What kind of leverage do I have in the market I'm buying in?
Because your strategy should change depending on the answer.
Imagine three houses.
House number one has been sitting on the market for 72 days with no offers.
House number two was listed yesterday and already has three offers.
House number three is new construction and the builder has six similar homes they would really like to sell before the end of the quarter.
Would I advise you to approach all three sellers the same way?
Of course not.
On one, price may be our biggest opportunity.
On another, asking for closing costs may make more sense.
With the builder, financing incentives could be far more valuable than getting another $10,000 knocked off the purchase price.
And on that brand-new listing with multiple offers?
Our strategy might simply be:
Don't get cute.
If it's the right house, the numbers work and it's priced appropriately, sometimes trying to “win” the negotiation by another $5,000 is how you lose the house you actually wanted.
Good representation isn't about negotiating everything just because we can.
It's about knowing where the leverage actually is.
And Then There Are the Headlines
Oh, the headlines.
One day:
HOME PRICES ARE FALLING!
Two days later:
HOME PRICES HIT NEW HIGH!
Then:
BUYERS ARE BACK!
Followed shortly by:
THE HOUSING MARKET IS FROZEN!
For heaven's sake, everybody calm down.
Here's the funny part:
Those stories might all contain perfectly legitimate data.
They may simply be measuring different cities.
Different property types.
Different price ranges.
Different time periods.
Or using different measurements entirely.
National housing data can be useful for understanding broader trends.
But here's what the national headline doesn't know:
Your neighborhood.
Your house.
Your mortgage.
Your financial situation.
Your family.
Your timeline.
Or why you're thinking about moving in the first place.
CNN doesn't know that your mother is moving in with you.
Zillow doesn't know you're retiring next year.
The national median home price doesn't know your third child just arrived and your adorable little starter home suddenly feels approximately the size of a carry-on suitcase.
Context matters.
Five Questions I Would Rather Have You Ask
So if you're thinking about making a move, forget “How's the market?” for a minute.
Let's answer these instead:
1. What's happening in my specific area?
Not nationally. Not even necessarily all of Boise or Meridian. What's happening where you actually own—or want to own?
2. What's happening in my price range?
Demand at $400,000 can look very different from demand at $900,000.
3. What am I competing against?
For sellers, that's the other choices your buyer has.
For buyers, it's the other buyers pursuing the same type of property.
4. How long are homes like this actually taking to sell?
Not the county average. The homes that actually resemble the one we're talking about.
5. What's being negotiated besides price?
Closing costs. Repairs. Rate buydowns. Builder incentives. Possession. Contingencies.
Sometimes the best deal isn't the one with the lowest purchase price.
Now we're asking questions that can actually help you make a decision.
Maybe the Market Isn't the Biggest Question Anyway
And this brings me to the part of this conversation I think gets overlooked most often.
There doesn't have to be a good market or a bad market for you to make a good decision.
Real estate is financial.
But it's also life.
People move because they're getting married.
Having children.
Getting divorced.
Taking a new job.
Retiring.
Caring for aging parents.
Downsizing.
Moving closer to family.
Wanting a backyard.
Wanting to never mow another backyard for the rest of their natural life.
Or sometimes because they walk into a room they've walked into 5,000 times before and suddenly realize:
This house doesn't fit our life anymore.
No housing report can tell you what to do with that.
The market doesn't know your life.
You do.
So...How IS the Boise Real Estate Market?
It depends.
And I don't mean that as a cop-out.
I mean that as the beginning of the conversation.
My job isn't to convince you that it's a good time to buy.
And it isn't to convince you that it's a good time to sell.
My job is to figure out what your market actually looks like, understand the leverage you have inside of it, and give you enough information to make a smart decision.
Sometimes the answer will be:
Move.
Sometimes:
Wait.
And sometimes you'll look at everything together and say:
“Leigh, we're not doing anything. We just wanted to understand our options.”
Perfect.
Knowing that before you make a decision is kind of the point.
So the next time somebody asks me:
“How's the real estate market?”
Don't be surprised when I answer:
Which one?
Because the market that matters isn't the one they're talking about on the news.
It's yours.
If you'd like to know what's actually happening in your corner of Boise, Meridian or the Treasure Valley, let's have a conversation. We can look at the numbers, your options and what you're trying to accomplish—and figure out what makes sense for you.
If you're considering selling and want to understand what your home could realistically command in today's Boise-area market — and how we would position it to create the strongest possible result — let's have that conversation.
Leigh
Boise's Best Real Estate
Inside Boise's Best: Market. Life. Local.
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