Home values are now declining in more than half of the country — the widest drop since the aftermath of the Great Recession.
New Zillow data shows 53% of U.S. homes have lost value over the past year — the highest share since 2012, when the housing crash bottomed out. While the national market appears flat overall, that average hides major regional and local differences.
Prices are falling across much of the South and West as inventory rises and buyers pull back. Many are waiting amid recession worries, mortgage rates still above 6%, and sellers unwilling to cut prices. Some of the steepest declines are in former pandemic boomtowns: 91% of Denver homes are below their peak value, along with 89% in Austin and 88% in Sacramento.
Florida has taken a major hit as well, with over 80% of homes in Jacksonville, Orlando, and Tampa now worth less than a year ago. Dallas and San Antonio are seeing declines above 85%. Zillow’s findings mirror a recent S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller report showing price drops in nine of the 20 largest U.S. metro areas.
Across the U.S., home values are down an average of 9.7% from their peak — a bigger dip than in 2022 but far from the 27% collapse after 2008.
Still, a few homeowners are underwater. The median gain since a home’s last sale is 67%, and in markets like Buffalo, San Jose, Providence, Columbus, and San Diego, values have doubled over time. Longer homeowner tenures in these areas have helped equity grow quickly.
Overall, very few Americans own homes worth less than they paid. Only 4.1% of U.S. homes are valued below their last sale price — an even smaller share than before the pandemic. Among new listings, just 3.4% are priced below the seller’s original purchase, about half the rate in 2019.
The highest share of below-purchase listings is in markets that soared fastest during the pandemic, such as San Francisco, Austin, and San Jose. But in many metros across the Northeast, Midwest, and Great Lakes, fewer than 2% of sellers are taking a loss.
