It may be only a zephyr but there’s a shift in the wind for the Sedona real estate market.

As June home sales across the country hit a ten-month low, National Association of Realtors Chief Economist, Larence Yun,  cited the last two years as being the worst U.S. housing market in three decades.  

Based on a distinctly dismal spring, we had expected a severe market drought in the summer of 2025. But a fresh wind arose. That typically slow season turned out to be a pleasant surprise. June saw the highest number of single-family residence sales so far in 2025 - up 31% from May and 11% higher than June  2022, 2023, and 2024. That breeze persisted when July sales exceeded July 2024 by a resounding 64%.

June and July pulled up the stats for the whole year dramatically. By May 2025, cumulative home sales were down 11% from 2024, and their Median Recorded Selling Price was 1% lower.  By early August, however, 2025’s sales had pulled up to dead-even with 2024’s, and its MRSP was 1% higher. That’s a dramatic turn-around, especially for our usual “Dog Days of Summer.”

Altos Research’s local Market Action Index reflected that.  For two years it had hovered at  30 – the divide between Sellers’ and  Buyers’ Markets. Over the summer it jumped to  the 42-44 range – a modest Sellers’ Market.  Another key figure is the percentage of active listings that have had price decreases. In May that was super-high at 40%. In late-July  and early August it was in the benign 28%-32% range.

That is thanks, partially, to a  sharp, but somewhat seasonal, drop in housing inventory. In May there were 193 homes actively on the market.  At the end of July there were 145.  A 25% downward swing. The other critical figure, pending sales, stood at 39 at the end of July compared to 31 in July 2024.

Despite Dr. Yun’s grim assessment of the past two years, noted above, he did wax optimistic about the second half of the year. NAR projects a 6% increase in sales by the end of  2025.  That’s debatable and perhaps somewhat Pollyannish compared with home price increase projections for the year from various other organizations.  Their range of projections is from Fannie Mae’s 4.1 % to Zillow’s minus 1.4. Their average is 1.6 %.  All-in-all, though, the consensus is for a stronger second half of 2025.

What’s changed?  

For one, the University of Michigan’s Consumer Confidence  Index  rose from 52.2 , the lowest since May 1980,  to 61.8.  still rather weak, but the highest it’s been since February.  That tends to translate into consumer spending.

Then, there seems to be a growing sense of resignation on the part of buyers that mortgage rates are likely to remain stable at roughly the 6.5% level for quite some time to come and that social media predictions of dramatic drops in the year ahead are simply fantasies.  So, putting family plans for an appreciable improvement in quality of life on hold indefinitely hoping for significantly better rates is a waste of time and resources.

Given the disturbing unemployment data recently released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, it’s reasonable to expect The Fed to have more urgency in finally starting to lower its rates in September.  That might eventually give a bit of respite to mortgage costs. Don’t, however, expect that to have an instant nor dramatic effect.  Fed rates have only an indirect connection to mortgages.  Mortgage rates are directly tied to 10-Year US Treasury Bond yields.  Treasury yield changes immediately reflect their buyers’ confidence in the stability and strength of the economy, the prospects for inflation, strength of the dollar, and the general solvency of the U.S. government. Concern about any of those things can drive yields up in order to attract more buyers. High yields mean high mortgage rates. 

That said, despite the initial shock to the economy from the current administration’s aggressive tariff policy, the  stock market seems to have come to terms with it enough to set all-time highs for the S&P 500 and Nasdaq. Potential buyers, wealthy enough to afford Sedona prices, have seen their equity portfolios rebound, often reaching new heights.  Now would to be a good time to diversify into inflation-hedging real property and finally purchase that dream home here. 

View Historical Sedona Market Statistics Here

Townhome-Condo Sector  -  Mid-Summer Update

As noted above, Single-Family Residence sales have this year have generally lagged those in 2024.  Not so for Condo/Townhomes.  Those sales have shot up 25%!  And, the MRSP is up over 7%. That continues to tell us a lot  about the resilience of that small, but significant sector of the housing market. 

VACANT RESIDENTIAL LOTS_-  Mid-Summer Update

While the Sedona Housing Market has rebounded from the 2008 Crash to unprecedented heights in the past decade, the Vacant Land Sector has generally languished. In August 2025 land sales are down, year-over-year, by 17%. But, at the same time, prices have risen sharply.  The MRSP rose 28% over 2024.

As Sedona housing prices soared to unprecedented heights during the Pandemic Years, the bright spot for buyers was the Vacant Land Sector. Back in 2006, the Median Recorded Selling Price for residential lots in Sedona was $519,000. That started coming back to earth in the first half of 2007 and had plummeted to $115,000 by 2011. In August  of 2025 that figure stands at $313,000 – a marked rebound from 2011 but obviously far short of 2006’s $519,000.

In 2021, with existing home inventory drying up, many prospective buyers decided to build what they really wanted and vacant land sales boomed - tripling the number of sales in 2020.  Since Midyear 2022, however, we’ve seen a significant downturn in land sales thanks, in part, to the general market and, in part, to sharply rising building costs. 

That said, what is also going down is the supply of vacant land.  In the summer of 2019, there were 292 Active Land Listings .  In August of 2025, there are only 100.

That presents a strong buying opportunity for astute investors.  Expect the price point to resume its upward trend as inventory continues to dwindle.  Eventually, as the non-renewable supply of vacant land is exhausted, we'll see prices sky-rocket from these bargain levels.  Keep in mind that vacant land is a non-renewable resource. Sedona is completely surrounded by U.S. National Forest and almost all the land that can be developed pretty much has been.

Meanwhile, we are still seeing Sedona luxury lots selling at huge discounts compared with the prices they fetched in 2006. At some high-end gated communities, you can still find a few luxury lots starting in $300,000’s. Back in 2006 those would have been priced at $700,000 or $800,000. More commonly, though, you can expect to pay $400,000 to $700,000 for a really good luxury lot and well over a million or two for something truly extraordinary.