Homebuyers continued to wait for mortgage rates to drop last year and sellers, especially condo owners, waited for buyers to show up in a meaningful way during what was another sluggish year for the state’s housing market, according to a monthly update from the Colorado Association of Realtors.
The number of single-family homes sold statewide rose a modest 3.1%, from 64,086 in 2023 to 66,098 in 2024. It was a big improvement from the 19.1% sales decline between 2022 and 2023. But the sales volume paled compared to the pace of prior years, like 2015, when the state saw 110,000 single-family homes sold and 2021 when nearly 98,000 homes sold, according to prior CAR reports.
If the single-family market was manageably cold, the townhome and condo market turned frigid as rising association and insurance costs scared would-be buyers away. Buyers purchased 9.6% fewer townhomes and condos last year than in 2023, despite there being a $157,500 cost advantage to going with an attached home statewide and a $215,000 gap in metro Denver.
A gap also showed up in changes in the supply of active listings for each housing type. The single-family home inventory rose 5.1% to 14,417 at the end of the year, while the condo and townhome inventory was up 20.7% to 5,080 last year as of December.
Getting to the closing table has also been much tougher for sellers, with 45% of listings that sold requiring a price cut last year. Single-family home listings that sold spent 54 days on average on the market last year compared to 49 days in 2023. For condos, the average went up from 48 to 59 days and was at 76 days in December, typically a less busy month.
“Buyers and sellers were forced to take a slower, more methodical approach to the market in 2024, as buyer demand was curbed by a lack of motivation,” said Denver Realtor Cooper Thayer in comments accompanying the report.
Thayer blamed a stubbornly high 30-year mortgage rate, which fluctuated between 6.5% to 7% despite Federal Reserve rate cuts in the last four months of the year. Buyers had been banking on lower mortgage rates and they didn’t arrive in 2024.
“With the slowdown in buyer activity, inventory on the market consistently remained over three months’ supply throughout most of the year, and homes took longer on average to sell. … However, the slower market was not necessarily unhealthy and provided cost-conscious buyers with relatively more options and more time to find a home,” he said.
Despite increasing affordability pressures and elevated interest rates, home prices refused to crack. Statewide, the median price for a single-family home was $580,000 in 2024, up 2.7% from $565,000 in 2023 on a year-to-date basis. Condo and townhome prices barely budged, falling from $425,000 in 2023 to $422,500 in 2024, or a 0.6% drop.
“During the brief 2024 moments when interest rates fell into the low sixes, buyers rose to the occasion and made purchases,” Fort Collins Realtor Chris Hardy said in the report. “These mortgage rate drops were never long-lived, and inventory continued to accumulate to levels not seen in at least five years.”
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